Every Waking Moment
by silversurf4
Summary: Kidnapping, beatings, torture & drug use  and that's just chapter one .  What's next for Crews & Reese? And will it tear them apart or cement their bond? COMPLETED:  26 MAY 2011
1. Chapter 1

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER 1**

The first time she was kidnapped was bad because she'd been all-alone in that basement and blindfolded. This time was worse because they'd taken Crews too.

If she thought fear for herself was bad, fear for him was worse.

They'd both been beaten in a way that doesn't break bones but was still incredibly painful. Their captors used sections of garden hose to beat their bare feet, which hurt far worse than Reese could have imagined. When she issued the first screams, they'd surprised her. It seemed as if her body cried out against her will. She couldn't remember forming the desire or giving voice to her pain – it just happened. The tears had come blows ago shining streaks of salt down her face; the whimpering shortly after muted muffled grunts and expressions of discomfort, but her own screams? Those shocked her. Then they'd stopped beating her – once she'd broken – once she'd screamed - that instant.

But Crews? He made no sound, showed no affect, even some how managed not to wince. He simply peacefully closed his eyes and let the blows come. He accepted them as one would raindrops or a bath in warm water. For his insolence they'd shackled him to the ceiling and beaten his torso with the long lengths of hose, until he coughed up blood and still Crews made no outcry. While Dani considered herself stubborn she was fast realizing that she didn't hold a candle to her red haired partner.

When they let him down, Crews collapsed onto the floor unmoving. He lay face down on the cold concrete with his face turned towards her and his guileless blue eyes open. He didn't move, he didn't blink and for a moment she thought he'd stopped breathing. They left and closed the door. She couldn't move but tried and that was when he issued a deep shuddering sigh and blinked. She froze unable to tear herself away from his eyes. Then Crews did the unimaginable – he smiled at her.

Dani wanted to cry more then than during the beatings_. How could this gentle man endure so much and still summon a smile to buoy her?_ She crossed the cold floor to him on her hands and knees and her hand shook as she reached to touch him. She brushed her palm across his cheek and stroked her thumb across the bronze sideburn under his bleeding ear, before sinking her fingers into his short red hair.

He was warmer than she expected. Something about the paleness of Crews' skin always made her expect him to be cold, but he was not. They stayed like that for what seemed a long time, but it was just a moment - before the door opened again and the real terror set in.

There were six, maybe eight men, in identical cheap suits, wearing ski masks and rubber gloves. They were built like professional football players and moved with the collectiveness knowledge of pack animals. Words – idle talk that might disclose something - was unnecessary to them – they communicated through nods, eye movements and gestures. She searched their faces for something she could recognize, a tattoo, a ring, something that she could use to identify them, but they were automatons and nothing about them revealed their identity, purpose or motive.

As she registered their approach, Charlie read immediate terror in her eyes. Her gaze switched from narrow and probing to wide eyed and panicked. Something worse than hoses, worse than a gun or a knife awaited them. Reese was not afraid of much, but what the men carried terrified in a way he'd only seen once on their very first case together. He raised his body off the floor on strength of will alone and was smashed back to the ground by a knee in his back.

Two men grabbed Dani under each arm and hauled her backwards pinning her to the far wall. That was when he saw it - a hypodermic needle dripping an amber liquid and the wildness in her eyes became rage and blind fear. Her panic was enough to break his silence. Crews begged the man grinding his knee into his back, "please don't." His single utterance drew their attention for a tiny fraction of a second before laughed and returned their attention to Dani.

She thrashed violently and tried unsuccessfully to stifle her pleas of "no, No, NO," as they reached a crescendo in an eerie keening wail as the man drove the needle home. It reminded Charlie for some crazy reason of a graveyard shift his rookie year with Bobby Stark in a radio car. Someone struck a deer once with a car, but didn't kill it. The animal lay unmoving in extreme distress emitting a high-pitched wail until Stark putting a bullet in it. The silence that followed the sharp retort of the pistol was heartbreaking. So too was his partners' silence on this day.

Tears formed in his eyes. What they could not summon from him with his own pain they had loosed with hers. They held her as the drug worked it's magic and as Crews watched her eyes glazed over, she passed out and slumped against the wall. Then the men left that same heartbreaking silence in their wake as the door slammed closed. They had done their job, breaking both strong willed detectives by using the other as the instrument of their torture.

Crews crawled to his young partner and pulled her still form into his lap. He curled his long fingers into the cool, darkness of her hair. The luxury of the simple act and the pleasure it gave him made Charlie feel guilty. He closed his eyes as tears slipped past them. The room had the silence of a tomb and for a fraction of a second before he gave himself over to the darkness – Charlie thought how easy it would be to meditate her with no other distractions. But that moment quickly passed and with adrenaline gone his tired body gave into the pain and shut down to heal itself. He hugged his tiny partner tightly as though someone might steal her from him.

The man in the room above watched on the closed circuit camera and smiled.


	2. Chapter 2

**Every Waking Moment **

**CHAPTER 2**

When Dani awoke she knew she was high, but she also felt safe which "high" never felt before. Her body was wrapped in strong arms. That had happened before – waking in the arms of a stranger. However, her sense of smell told her Crews was nearby, long before she opened her eyes. The crisp masculine scent of his cologne, mixed with the tang of his sweat, bit at the back of her throat. He was very close, so close she could taste him – or - _maybe she just wanted to_ - her drug addled brain goaded. Drugs made her libertine and while she would have, she knew her partner would not, unless perhaps they drugged him too?

This was her thought as her dry eyelids rasped open, crusted from sleep after too many tears. He had pulled her into his lap and was cradling her against his chest and he slept, exhausted from torture. Again the need to touch him overwhelmed her. Ever since the day Roman had told her she could not, Dani just couldn't seem to stop touching Charlie Crews. He endured it fairly well, but she found herself mortified by her compulsion to brush the back her hand against his as they walked or to lean into him in the elevator. The car was where it was the worst because Crews often sat with his hands in his lap and it would be so easy to reach over and capture one in hers.

It took her a moment to focus; his face was so close. The fine hairs of his chin showed it had been too many hours since their capture; the Charlie Crews she knew didn't do unshaven. There was the hint of a mustache, which would not take long to appear, in the deep rich scarlet color of the stubble over his pale pink lips. His bottom lip was split and blood welled there in a rosy unnatural color. His lidded heavy eyes hid their pale sapphire gems deep under blonde lashes and his breathing was labored – probably from one or more broken ribs. As she tried to move, he gripped her more tightly in his sleep, so she stopped, instead reaching out her hand again for the warmth of his face.

She thumbed across his rough and chapped bottom lip, as the crimson of his budding beard pricked at her palm and his eyes snapped open. The blues there were not his normal color. His eyes beamed at her with intensity, pain and something else bubbled under their normally imperturbable surface. He licked his lips as she shyly withdrew her hand and his usually smooth voice, wrapped in layers of sleepy sandpaper asked, "Are you alright?" She nodded and made as if to rise, but he held her fast.

"Don't go?" his plea burst forth in a tight whisper. She stilled and held his gaze not sure he knew he'd said it. But he recovered quickly from his expression of need, "I think they are watching us and if they know we're awake, they may come back."

_Of course_, Dani she chastised internally, _a man that tough doesn't need you_. The moment stretched with her lying in her partner's arms, the warmth of his body seeping into hers everywhere they touched and though she tried to look away her eyes found his until she surrendered to what she saw there – concern and something she didn't want to give voice to. The blue eyes of the man holding her tightly mesmerized her; only part of that was the drug.

For several minutes he simply returned her gaze expressionless as if they were engaged in a staring contest no one had any interest in winning. But gradually she could see wonder seeping out of him, as the corners of his eyes crinkled and his lips twitched slightly. He was trying not to smile and when this revelation dawned on her it brought a smile unbidden to her face. He unconsciously reciprocated with a gentle smile that projected both warmth and comfort. It was incongruent with his battered face, but it buoyed her. Then Crews softly asked what he wanted to know, "What do you see in there, Reese?"

Her response stayed on her tongue as the door swung open and the men approached again with the hypodermic. Every muscle in her relaxed body tried to tense, but she was unable to summon a physical response. Charlie felt her fear course through him like an electric current. He forced her from his lap and struggled to a kneeling position defending her, shielding her with his battered body.

But they weren't there for her this time – this time they were there for him. As the men lifted him off his knees, Crews regained his footing briefly pivoting and delivering a lightning quick blow to the throat of one man who dropped to the floor struggling for breath.

"Dammit, I told you not to underestimate him," a disembodied but hauntingly familiar voice warned from a speaker in the ceiling.

But another strong body took the downed man's place and Crews was pinned against the wall with enough force to make him see stars. His ribs ached and his spine shot white pain into his brain. The room swam and he felt the needle bite into the flesh of his bicep.

Moments later the cold steel slid from his arm and one of the men kneed him hard in the groin bending Crews over. The next thing he felt was a dazzling blow to his jaw delivered with enough force to spin him around and propel him into the waiting concrete wall of their prison. Crews fell at an odd angle as the wall effectively knocked him out cold and the men walked wordlessly from the room.

Dani focused hard on making her muscles obey as she crawled to her partner and straightened his slack limbs out. She could not wake him but could feel his strong heart beat against his chest and watched the rhythmic rise and fall of his breathing. He was not going to die, not yet anyway. She could not drag him anywhere as she could barely control her own limbs and she settled against his warm body to stave off the cold of the floor and the slick walls.

Minutes passed and time became untellable. She couldn't remember if they'd been there hours or days – she drifted from waking to sleeping – always in pain, always in need. Then the door opened again and it stayed open.

A door beyond that opened and sunlight beckoned. They'd simply thrown open the doors to their prison. They'd endured torture and beatings with no questions, drugging with no movement_. What kind of fresh hell was this? _She wondered. _Could they go? Or was this another trap?_

She tried again to rouse her partner and he groaned, then she spoke his name softly and his eyes blinked. Gone was the blue of before – now they were an eerie blue green and unfocused. He lazily looked at her and smiled. He was still very high and he reached to touch her face stroking her hair back and sliding his warm palm along her cheek. He wove his fingers into her hair in a very intimate gesture that betrayed his desires.

She shook him off and barked his name as forcefully as she could summon, "Crews."

"Uh-huh," was the murmured response.

"Get up," she demanded tugging on his arm.

"Can't we just lay here a little longer," the voice of a young boy came back to her as his blonde lashes fluttered against his cheek. He was still in dreamland.

"Detective Crews," she stiffened the command in her voice trying to overcome their mutual malaise. "We are leaving. Now see that door?" She tried to pulling him into a sitting position, "I need you to get to it. Can you do that?"

"I'd do anything you want," he offered with his eyes wide and still looking only at her.

"Crews," she growled pulling harder on his arms. His body complied, but his eyes never left her. She remembered this part of the euphoria – the time when you loved everyone. They all looked beautiful and kind. "Concentrate on the door Crews," she demanded sliding under his arm.

He continued to look at her and then softly offered, "I wish you'd call me Charlie."

His tenderness was almost her undoing as she turned away from the blinding white daylight to his cool eyes and pale face. Even bloodied he was a beautiful man. The light played across his features accentuating the red and blondes of his hair and lashes. He was still far too dazed to notice the light and his pupils remained large and black from the narcotic.

She wet her lips and reached for patience, "if I call you Charlie will you come with me?" she bargained with her love struck partner. He nodded mutely.

"There," she pointed. "Take me there, Charlie. To the light," she implored.

To her wonder he struck out without much of a stagger at all. Despite all the punishment and abuse he was able to summon the will to move. His body was clearly stronger than the drug, but his mind was not. She had the opposite problem. Her reasoning was returning, but her limbs were still rubbery and she swayed. He tugged her tightly against him and continued focused on fulfilling her wish. He stopped when they reached the second door, just as she'd commanded.

"Okay?" he asked for her approval.

"Yeah, terrific Crews," she absently replied looking for something familiar.

"Charlie," he said softly again. "You promised," the little boy returned to his tone.

"Charlie," she repeated exasperation apparent in her tone.

"You don't like me do you?" He questioned the drug having taken hold of his brain while his body fought it valiantly, "which is weird," he continued undeterred, "because I love you," his confession bubbled forth.

"Oh, brother," she mumbled. "We need to get out of here Cr…Charlie," she corrected herself when a frown marred his face.

"Where do you want to go?" he asked simply.

"Home," she muttered. "We need to get home," she explained still looking around.

They were in the middle of nowhere. Crews were he here, instead of light years away in his head, would remind her that "you can't be nowhere." She looked expectantly at him waiting for his Zen to mock her unspoken thought, but he simply stared at her and sighed contentedly. She realized neither of them were tracking well, she was only slightly more focused because of her experience and the time she'd had to metabolize whatever they'd been dosed with.

"Great," she said to herself, "you're not going to be any help at all are you?"

They moved in tandem, her brain guiding them and his limbs providing the meaningful movement for what seemed like hours. Gradually, Dani began to gain some better motor control and just as Crews seemed to flag, but they made it about a mile before a pickup coasted to a stop and asked if they needed help.

The motorist took them to the address Crews provided, his home. Dani did not want a hospital even though the man suggested it. Crews wanted to please her, so he wanted whatever she did – to go home.

Once there, Dani fished her partner's wallet out of a place she never expected to put her hands – Crews pants - and gave the man everything green in it.

They stumbled up the stairs and collapsed into his bed in a heap, then the world faded and the dreams came, but not before her partner once again pulled her tightly against him and laid a chaste kiss against her forehead. His confession was one part drug and one part truth he could not conceal – this was her last conscious thought as sleep took her.


	3. Chapter 3

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER 3**

Past trips returned in her dreams, waking to a stranger – the room, the man, the drug - meaningless. The person she least recognized was herself. She cycled through the repertoire of her past: the haze of euphoria, followed by the maddening canyon of need; the stench of crack smoked through a battered aluminum can and the painless smoothness of fingers seared by the hot glass pipe. Bubbling black tar in a spoon and the snap of the rubber hose as the drug shot through her spreading vibrant colors in its wake. Nights in rehab when her skin crawled and she felt like peeling it off to get at the pain underneath. She writhed and thrashed trying to escape. Soundless cries died on her lips as his voice came to her like a lifeline to a drowning man.

"Shhhh, Dani, I got you…" he told her.

She drifted away again.

* * *

><p>Crews woke to a man in the doorway to his bedroom clearing his throat. For half a second he thought the suits were back, but then he noticed the man shifted uncomfortably. His fought hard to focus his eyes on the uneasy man – their Captain – Dani's lover – Kevin Tidwell.<p>

Tidwell seemed to waver between going and staying, between anger and embarrassment - as if he was intruding on something he shouldn't be. Charlie focused on the dark haired beauty in his arms. During the night he'd tugged the duvet over them both and for all appearances they looked "together," which Charlie quickly deduced was the reason for Tidwell's discomfort.

"Captain," Crews croaked.

"Look," Tidwell started his eyes were downcast as he gutted out what he wanted to say, "I've been worried sick about you two. Had half the department looking for you and I come here to find you look like you had a wild night, got drunk wrecked your car and had sex with your partner."

"That's not what happened," Crews rasped, his voice gone from the dry air.

"Oh yeah," the incredulity evident in his bosses voice, "where's your car?"

Crews breathed to object, to defend, but got no chance.

"She's gorgeous, I know," Tidwell offered meekly, "hard - maybe impossible to resist…but next time let someone know so I don't have half the Department scouring the countryside for you." He turned on his heel and left with his mistaken impression firmly in place.

Charlie moved to catch him and both his body and his partner groaned in protest.

He couldn't and wouldn't cause Reese pain; but this was going to take some serious explaining to Tidwell. He wondered why the man was so quick to presume they'd been intimate and then considered their situation. Dani was sunk deep into the center of his bed; he was coiled around her and draped over her protectively. All that was visible was her dark tresses against his chest. For all intents and purposes it looked as bad as Tidwell had presumed.

Even if he was able to arrest the Captain's flight Charlie was not prepared to tell him about their capture. Dani refused hospitals with the intransigence of a cat to bathwater and this would be no different. _Who would believe them anyway? Yeah, we were kidnapped, beaten, tortured, drugged and then released_. Them sneaking off for a romantic tryst was an easier sell.

He shook Reese gently and brushed her hair from her face. She blinked awake and examined him through long lashes with her coffee colored eyes. His reflexive grin coaxed a sleepy smile from her and suddenly his chest tightened and breath hitched. Tidwell was not too far off, he realized. She was amazingly warm and close. His body responded on its own accord and as she realized where and how close they were a crimson flush tinged her olive skin. She struggled to sit and distance herself from him.

They said nothing and both fidgeted, before she sighed and exclaimed, "shit it's not like we did anything."

"Let's hope your boyfriend's view is as enlightened," he offered caustically.

She twisted her head to look at hi, "What?"

"Tidwell. He was here, and I'm pretty sure he thought we got drunk, wrecked my car and ended up here together," he explained their dilemma as dispassionately as possible.

"Great," she gritted her teeth and swiveled her legs over the side of the bed. She gingerly rose, obvious sore and wobbly. She heard the sheets rustled as he moved to mirror her actions. "Don't move," she warned. "You'll just fall over and then we'll be in more trouble."

"Where are you going?"

"Bathroom," she stated the obvious angrily.

Charlie knew better than to inquire further. He reclined and gently tested his range of motion, which was not great, but better than he'd expected. She returned and stood before him with a wet cloth.

"Take off your shirt," she demanded.

He stared mutely at her, knowing her could not lift his arms over his head.

She seemed to reason this out while he watched her and reached for the hem of his shirt when he didn't comply. He felt her hair brush his cheek as she leaned close and drew the bloody shirt over his head. He could smell her in the way the blind man in the antique shop could. He was tuned into her in a way that made him thinking of Discovery channel and some show he vaguely recalled about pheromones, absently wishing he'd paid more attention. He grunted as she forced his arms over his head and the pain from his ribs flared.

She tossed the shirt on the floor at her feet and began to wipe the crusted dried blood from his face and neck. She was not gentle as her limber digits roughly manipulated his chin away from her to give her better access to his battered brow, hairline and ears. He fidgeted as she worked the cloth around the contours of his ear, wiping away the stubborn dried blood buried in the deep contours, but otherwise sat very still as her small hands travelled over his body and removed the signs of their battle. He wondered if when it was over if she'd let him wash her body in the same way – concluding that was a very bad idea. Then he realized Reese would never allow someone to care for her in that way.

What he did not know is that Reese was keeping herself busy to avoid the clawing need that was scraping at her insides. The drug awoke that feeling in her, the one from her nightmares – itching on the inside, twitchy, nervous and wanting, desire for the drug, any drug, even the pain – something to make the world and all the problems in it go away. She tried hard to concentrate on the task and not the man, but when she got to his scarred chest it was hard not to see the pain he'd endured from all those beatings, stabbings and other unmentionable attacks he'd suffered. Suddenly she found herself unable to see was tears filled her eyes, she wiped angrily at them with the back of her hand and continued more determined to ignore her own pain and her own need.

Charlie's warm hands closed over her cheeks on either side framing her face. She tried to shake him off, but he held her fast and stilled her nervous energy. She closed her eyes and let the tears fall. He didn't move, almost didn't breathe until her choked sob admitted her failure.

"I want it so bad," she confessed.

"I know, honey," he shushed her and leaned forward and lightly kissing her eyes, tasting the salt there. He knew how bad it was from the fact she didn't even blink at his affectation, his touch, the intimacy she usually rejected. Her default scowl was absent as she struggled to keep her bottom lip from quivering. She hurt so bad – inside - and there was nothing he could do to help her, to sooth her.

There was no cloth, no balm, no salve that would satisfy the urge she felt. They had to last it out and the need would fade dully over time, but it would be intensely painful and challenging. Charlie knew drugs, he'd been in prison, he even knew hard drugs, but he did not have an addictive personality – so those things had never been seductive to him. Reese was a horse of different color. That freakish controlling quality she showed to the world had a dangerous flip side. She relished the out of control aspect of addiction and it sucked her down fast.

She struggled for control, dropping the cloth her hands closed over the backs of his and her breaths came ragged deep gasps as she remained with her eyes squeezed tightly shut. "Please - Charlie. No matter what I say – you can't let me have it," she begged him to save her from herself.

"I won't, honey. I won't," he promised.

She no longer cared if his love was a function of the drug or not. She just needed to know she was not alone, even if it was false – she needed to believe in someone or some thing and the one she chose was him.


	4. Chapter 4

**Every Waking Moment **

**CHAPTER FOUR**

He thought she was okay. It was the only reason he left her. But she wasn't.

And when he limped out of the bathroom – Dani Reese was gone.

His mind raced wildly. His heart beat a wild staccato in his bruised chest. The ache of the broken rib was forgotten as a different kind of ache surpassed the dull pain there. She worried him in ways that he'd tried to forget and had vowed to give up.

He didn't know if they'd taken her or if she'd run. Either option was bad. It didn't make sense that they'd release them to get a decent night's sleep and then retake her alone. But nothing they'd done so far made sense. _Why torture someone and ask no questions? Who were they and what did they want with the two of them?_

He knew that she hated feeling weak or vulnerable. He had just seen her about as fragile as he'd thought possible - twice now. The first time on their first case together and now - both times it was the drugs that frightened her. He thought she trusted him because they'd been through so much together, but she was as proud as she was stubborn. He begrudgingly concluded – she'd run– because running was what Dani did, as much as it disappointed him.

He didn't know if he should call Tidwell, or not. Even with his mistaken impression, bruised ego and anger; he would pull out all the stops to find Dani - her ex-lover. That's how Charlie thought of him now although it had been milliseconds in the scheme of things since he'd walked out thinking Crews and Reese were intimate.

Technically, they hadn't even broken up, Dani wasn't even aware of what had happened. There was no confrontation, no ending, just another jagged hole…in a life full of holes. He wondered if she'd choose him…or if she'd go back to Tidwell for about a half a second and then he returned to worrying about her whereabouts.

In the back of his mind the nagging questions still formed. He twisted the questions over in his brain and reformed them. _Where did she go? Was she in trouble? From them or herself? Did she need space or help? Had they taken her again? Was she being tortured or beaten or worse? Did she leave of her own accord? And if she did, why?_

Fear paralyzed him, until he reached for his Zen – that which had saved him so many times - would have to save them both. His mind was strong now, not like before. The drug had made his mind weak and in that weakness he knew things dribbled from his lips that scared his young partner. She feared losing love so much that she denied herself its comfort. She took refuge in the coupling of her body with another's for the physical release, but not him – never him.

He'd foolishly hoped she allowed herself more with Tidwell, but it was not to be. She was too damaged for someone so inexperienced to handle; even someone with as good a heart as their Captain. Tidwell thought three ex-wives prepared him for the darkness, but it didn't. No, Dani Reese needed him – someone who knew the darkness she lived in, someone who could know her pain as completely as his own. She knew it and he knew it. It was time he stopped denying it, stopped hiding from it, stopped running from it. It was time he embraced it and in doing so he would save them both. So he went where he knew she'd go – not initially, but finally.

He went to her small apartment, let himself in with his knife (another trick he'd learned up in Crescent City) and waited. It would be a long wait, but he was a patient man.

* * *

><p>Dani wandered after she'd taken the cab away from Crews' mansion. She had no particular destination in mind, just away. She needed to be away from him, with his pale blue eyes, warm hands and the gentleness and concern there. She couldn't hide from him and it was that more than his slick veneer and razor sharp exterior she fled from. She need to get away - away from Tidwell, away from her father and everyone else who expected something of her. She could hold her father at bay – a lifetime of his anger and indignation had trained her to tune him out. She could tune Tidwell out – he was simple, kind and harmless, but she didn't love him and she never would.<p>

But Crews? Crews was a violent, fast acting fever. He was like unto a drug that burned in her veins; one that she knew would hook her if she even had just a taste of it – so she ran. She ran from the look on his face and in his eyes. She ran from the weakness she'd shown and the comfort she'd wanted to accept - from her partner.

She ended up where she always did on a dingy street corner in a bad section of town. The man there asked her for her desire and she chose something legal – almost. Oxycontins – eight of them. She passed the man $200 and pocketed the white oblong stupor inducing little gems. She just needed to feel nothing for a while and these would do the trick. She trudged up the street and bought a $40 bottle of Chivas Regal and wandered home.

Along the way, she palmed two pills and swallowed them with a swig of Chivas that burned all the way down. The whiskey's sharp sting brought tears to her eyes, but she stubbornly refused to let them fall. Her plans was to be so far gone that by the time she made it home, she'd collapse into bed, forget this world and her problems in it – for a few hours anyway. She convinced herself that a few hours was all she needed – knowing deep down that a crash was coming - one that would hurt them both.


	5. Chapter 5

**Every Waking Moment **

**CHAPTER 5**

Charlie had dozed off – his meditation giving way to sleep as he awaited his young partner in the place he knew she'd eventually come to collapse. Her home was Spartan and everything in it utilitarian. There was nothing of herself in her home, she was in this world, but not of it – not connected to it - in that way she was like him. She was connected to him in more ways than she could know or appreciate. They both floated in the stream but refused to get wet. They repelled the water through sheer will power.

She worked hard to get the keys into the lock and her lack of coordination was apparent as she stumbled through the doorway – stifling her own laugh with the back of her hand. The bottle of expensive whiskey missed the table and landed with a dull thud on the carpeted floor, Dani ignored it. She began stripping off clothes as she retreated down the hallway to her bedroom.

Crews felt like a voyeur as he watched her unhook her bra and it trailed on the floor behind her. Shoes came next and when he heard the zipper of her jeans he looked down before her naked back became her naked backside. He heard her flop into the bed and waited about ten minutes until the sound of soft snoring signaled her deep sleep before he began picking up after her.

He retrieved her discarded clothes and placed them in the hamper. He poured the remainder of the Chivas down the drain – noting she'd consumed far more than he could have managed and still remain upright and mobile. He felt for the drugs he knew had to be present and found them in the pocket of her jeans. He flushed the pills down her toilet and packed a light bag for her – a t-shirt, jeans, socks, underwear, the bra she'd left in the hallway, a toothbrush, her hairbrush and her sunglasses, which she'd need when she woke. He stuffed a thick sweater from her closet on top and tossed the bag into the hall.

He studiously ignored her bare chest as he found a hockey jersey in her closet, trying hard not to think about the man it probably belonged to, and slipped it over her head. He found a pair of LAPD sweats and shimmied her legs into them before standing her up and pulling them to her waist. He then carried her over his shoulder to his waiting car and dropped her bag next to his in the backseat and belted her into the passenger seat.

Where he was taking her, she wouldn't need fancy clothes, she wouldn't need any clothes and she wouldn't be permitted her armor or that whiskey barbiturate crutch. He was about to strip her bare – take away all her defenses if only to show her that she didn't need them – not with him.

He steeled himself as he listened to his Zen tape drinking in the lessons, letting them soak into his brain and permeate his psyche as thoroughly as the alcohol had anesthetized his partner.

As he entered the mountains he switched off the radio and drove in silence for several hours before reaching a small cabin high in the wood. He kept the windows closed although he wanted to open them to feel the crisp bite of the mountain air because he knew the cold air would rouse her. Neither of them was ready for that yet.

Their route took them up a winding dirt road, nearly above the tree line. Fresh snow was just beginning to fall. The ground was dusted with white snowflakes that crunched under his feet as he carried the groceries he bought on the way into the small single room cabin. He pulled his partner from the car and tucked her into the bed. He tucked a hair behind her ear and caressed her face lightly with his knuckles. She turned into the heat of his hand. He leaned close and whispered "I love you Dani Reese." Even in her sleep she managed a scowl.

He went outside and gathered cords of wood to build a fire. He sat and watched her sleep for hours, carefully checking her pulse and ensuring that she wasn't overdosing. She was such a small woman with such a mighty heart and appetite. She was out cold, but her pulse was strong and steady. She was safe and would slumber through the night.

To manage his nervousness and control his emotions he cut more wood while she slept. The heavy rhythmic action of the axe and the sound of splitting wood soothed him. _Before enlightenment – chop wood, carry water; after enlightenment – chop wood, carry water_. This is what his Zen held and it mocked him.

His battered body and bruised limbs protested, but he'd worked with pain before.

She was worth it. For her he would endure much more. For her he'd already demonstrated that he'd die. But this time he had to do much more than die – he had to live. Living was by far the harder thing to do. When he'd given up in prison, when he'd let death take him – let go of all he loved and accepted the death of his old self, his old life – he was freed. She needed to see this – he had to show her.

* * *

><p>She battled back from the fog. Sand filled her eyes, cotton her throat and bile her mouth. Strong arms pulled her up and cool liquid flowed down her parched throat. It felt like ice on a burn – a good kind of pain. She coughed and groaned weakly.<p>

A voice she knew whispered, "I love you Dani Reese," in her ear as she slipped away again.

The fire crackled in the smallness of the room. The flickering firelight cast long eerie shadows on the walls of the tiny room. The embers were burning cerulean blue and a vibrant orange as he stared into their depths and considered their situation. Kidnapped two days ago by men they didn't know - tortured, drugged and never asked a thing. That type of sadism had a purpose and direction, but one he didn't know. Everything to this point had been focused on his past, but either he'd inadvertently uncovered something new or this was all connected. His gut told him what he already knew – what he always said – what he'd learned – "it's all connected."

Her dry rasping call roused him from his musing. It was his name she was calling, but not the one he was used to. This time when she spoke to him, it was as he'd asked – it was "Charlie" she wanted. He sat beside her and told her that he was there. She reached blindly for him and his hand found hers. She settled again and he curled himself around her in the small bed and fell asleep to the sound and shadows of the fire.


	6. Chapter 6

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER SIX**

The hulking man in the cheap suit entered the room with cautiousness and trepidation in his every move and fear in his voice as he spoke the words he knew would bring him pain, "Uh…sir…."

"What?" came the terse unfriendly reply.

The man swallowed hard, "We…we uh…we lost'em."

The elder man ran a hand through his salt and peppered hair and issued a heavy, ragged, disappointed sigh. "Didn't I tell you not to underestimate them?"

'They were in his…" the strong man began his excuse, "we thought they'd stay put…"

The rest of his excuse died on his lips as a sharp staccato sounded from the silenced pistol, making a perfectly round hole in his forehead. His mouth held a rounded "o" as a formed word stayed on his tongue. He seemed shocked to be dead - right before he fell face first onto the floor with a resounding wet smack and thud.

"I don't pay you to think," the grey haired man shouted. "I pay you to do as you're told - and I told you – NOT to let them out of your sight! One of you apes get in here," he barked.

Another burly, nondescript man appeared in the doorway, looking uneasy and for all intents and purposes as if he'd been shoved by his cohorts. He even stumbled getting through the door.

"It seems this is your lucky day. You've been promoted," the grey haired man smiled sadistically. "Get that," he gestured at the body pooling blood on the floor, "out of here and see that he is not found."

The new head henchman nodded mutely and swallowed nervously.

"Then reacquire Detective Crews and his partner," the boss directed.

"How are we supposed to?" the burly man asked hesitantly.

"Christ Almighty! Do I have to do everything myself?" the elder man shouted, his temper renowned for the obvious reason. "Track his cell, track hers, track the GPS in his car," the man groaned. "Our people in the Department will help."

"Yes, sir." The young man nearly yelped in response, "Got it."

"And son? Unless you want to join your friend there," he dismissively flung the back of his hand toward the dead man, "contemplating your screw ups in the next life – don't lose them."

"Yes, sir," the burly man managed as he grabbed his predecessor by the ankles and dragged him out the door leaving a bloody swath on the white tiled floor.

The sound of the body sliding on the tile was the only noise in the room as silence descended once more and the grey haired man returned to his cigarette. He lazily blew smoke rings at the ceiling. The way to Crews was through his partner.

As a young man, Crews had impeccable standards, top of his class, keen, physically fit and intelligent both intellectually and in other ways – for example, when it came to reading people. He was a natural – it was one of the reasons he was chosen. Didn't matter that he didn't want it – when "they" chose you – you didn't decline their offer.

The botched thing with the Seybolt family was a huge mistake; an aberration and then the boy became a sacrificial lamb to protect the project. Prison had placed him out of their reach or so they thought – and yet?

Here he was again – tougher than ever – their phoenix risen from the ashes of Pelican Bay – sullied, but street wise. After prison, Crews was even more attractive to them, if he could be convinced to join - he would never betray them. Post prison Charlie Crews couldn't be broken, not by the LAPD, not by the DA, not by the feds, not if even J Edgar Hoover had himself rose from the grave. Crews would assure the success of their enterprise. Because while the Charlie Crews who went into prison was a straight arrow; the Charlie Crews that came out of prison was a straight razor.

He had high castle walls and surrounded himself with a moat made of Zen. He was tougher than ever, but not impenetrable - not with the right tool… Everyone knew Crews was far too stubborn to be turned on his own, but find something – someone he cared about? That was the key.

The chink in his armor was his affection for those closest to him; his blindness where they were concerned. While the effort with Tom Seybolt was horribly botched, they'd miraculously been given a second chance – with Jack Reese's daughter, of all people. It was almost poetic justice – nearly too good, too rich, to be true. Jack walked away from them and they hadn't been able to punish for his insolence at the time, but this? This was a way to kill two proverbial birds with one very sharp stone.

The man laughed, but without gusto. His laugh was a sibilant whisper filled with smoke like the man who owned it – it was a ghost, a shadow – not there at all.


	7. Chapter 7

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER 7**

Dani woke feeling as though she'd been run over by a truck, a big mean eighteen-wheeler with chains on the tires – hauling something heavy like bricks or steel pipes. Her limbs were leaden, her body ached, even her hair hurt. She also knew that she'd brought this on herself. Her mind woke first, before she even opened her eyes to let the world in, but the world came in anyway – in other ways, things her eyes could shut out but her other senses could not deny.

She smelled wood burning, felt the warmth of another curled around her, draped over her. It made her think of him – of Crews. The way this stranger jealousy guarded her was the way Charlie would have - the way he did the other morning when she'd pretended to be asleep while her partner helped her break up with her ex-boyfriend, Kevin Tidwell. That's how she thought of him now.

She lay still and silent letting Tidwell assume they'd been intimate because she wanted out of the problem of Kevin Tidwell - the nice man she didn't love. And because she wanted something more than Tidwell could give her; she wanted him – Crews. Every day since the one in that orange grove when Roman Nevikov told her "no" – she tried to get to him, to touch him, to connect with him - maybe even before that day, but that was when it crystallized in her head.

Lips brushed her temple, pressing a chaste kiss there. The gesture was too tender to be anyone but him and she could just make out a faint hint of his expensive cologne. He was here, wherever here was. It was pleasure and pain together again – just as she remembered. She didn't move, tried not to breath and let herself drift back to sleep, but he was onto her.

He felt the change in her and he told her so, "It's no use. I know you're awake."

She squinted against what she was sure would be the brutal onslaught Los Angeles' little daggers of daylight but there was no need. They were in an inky twilight. Light filtered weakly through a tiny window, crusted in snow, beyond that pine needles showed a deep green and the glow of a long dead fire cast a pale orange color on her already ruddy partner's features. He hadn't shaved in days. He was well past scruffy and headed for bearded in a meaningful way. She never noticed that about him. Crews was smooth and clean every day at work, but they were no where near work now.

"Where are we?" she croaked.

He moved to get her a glass of water, but made no effort to answer her.

"Crews," she tried to bark at him after swallowing several mouthfuls of water.

He inclined his head at her and quirked his eyebrows in response, but said nothing.

"What time is it?" she demanded struggling to sit.

He squatted and stoked the fire with fresh wood, ignoring her entirely. After a deep breath, he rose and grabbed another blanket, which he draped over her shoulders as she sat up, while the room warmed. The fire had gone out in the night. She could see his breath in the air as he moved stiffly around the small room. It was bitterly cold even inside the small cabin of rough-hewn wood. She shivered and he reached to touch her, but she flinched and he withdrew. He moved quietly but with purpose, preparing a blue enamel pot and swung it over the fire on a rod iron hook. Dani needed coffee first – answers later, but it didn't stop her demanding looks and tone.

"Crews," she beckoned this time with a bit of whine in her voice.

He looked at her – looked through her. She looked away, but when she looked back he was still there – still gazing at her. This time she rephrased – it wasn't a demand it was a request.

"Charlie…" she began. He blinked and smiled. "Where are we? When are we?" The strangeness of her question made her grimace, but it was the right question.

"We are here and it is now. All other human knowledge is moonshine," her partner recited some splinter of Zen that gave her nothing. A non-answer. He excelled at them.

Anger flooded her brain and she winced in pain. She squeezed her eyes shut and breathed - willing calm to make the pain abate. When she opened her eyes he was standing before her with a glass of orange juice and two aspirin in his outstretched palm. She reached for the pills and her fingers brushed his palm and they both felt it. Electricity, heat, friction – blessed and tantalizingly close.

She broke contact and tossed the pills into her mouth, throwing her head back furiously to swallow. She wanted something more, something stronger, something else. He was inside her personal space in an instant. With her head back, she way already off balance, so sweeping her off her feet was not hard. She froze as she felt him all around her. Once again his mouth was at her temple, his lips and the coarseness of his beard brushing past her cheek. He paused just short of her ear and mouthed the words so softly a dog would have trouble hearing them, but there was no mistaking the message in her ear. It was the one from her dreams, "I love you Dani Reese."

Then he was gone. Across the room like he'd teleported there.

"Stop saying that," she spat.

"Stop saying it? Or stop doing it?"

This stymied any effective inquiry. _Damn him and his fucking Zen_ she thought.

She didn't utter the words, but her eyes told him of her ire and outrage. He loved her eyes, coal black and so very expressive. They told him more about her than her outward expression of anger did. There was fear there, outrage at his audacity, deep-seated turmoil – a result of the conflicting emotion he triggered in her. She held it all inside so well, but he'd learned to read her. For him her answers, the ones she wouldn't give voice to, leaked out through her eyes - tiny blackened windows to her soul.

Coffee?" He offered with a slight smile, changing tactics too fast for her still waking brain. He poured the steaming water into a French press and produced a piping hot cup of strong black coffee for each of them. He was toying with her – pushing her buttons. He knew it and she knew it. He feinted, she parried. He pressed, she withdrew – it was their dance.

She took the offered blue enamel cup of liquid awareness and closed her eyes as the steam brought the strong flavor to her nose. She breathed it in and waited. She knew he wanted her eyes, so she'd deny them to him. Two could play at this game.

He said nothing for long enough to make her look for him. When she did, he smiled. He'd won again. This was getting disappointing. Dani Reese was a master manipulator of men – he was driving her berserk with his damned imperturbable veneer. Her sigh was heavy and full of despair.

"Why are we here?"

"We are here to figure this out," he replied calmly.

"Figure what out?" she played dumb.

"Why us? What did they want?" he explained. "We're safe here. We're alone for miles. Anyone comes knocking we'll know." He watched her ease, as the matter became more clinical and less personal. He let her go, let her have it - because she needed it, but in the back of his mind there was more. With Dani there was always more. _What do you really want Charlie?_ _Can you two handle this path?_ These questions echoed in the back of his brain.

She sipped her coffee quietly and shivered against the cold. He pulled the wool sweater from her bag, offering it with an outstretched hand. She wordlessly took the offered help and set her coffee down to slip it over her head. Acceptance – it was a start. He wanted to wrap his arms around her, but this would have to do – for now.

* * *

><p>"Tell me what you're thinking," she demanded. It was late in the afternoon and he was still unusually reticent.<p>

You could fill a set of encyclopedias with the things he was thinking about her alone, but he kept that to himself. "Well, either it's someone new we've pissed off…" he ventured, "or…"

"…it's all connected," she finished for him.

"Yeah," he admitted touched she embraced his way of thinking.

"But Roman's gone. You killed him," she thought aloud. "Who profited from Roman being gone?"

"Rayborn," Charlie replied darkly.

"Seems a bit sadistic for him," she doubted his conclusion. Charlie hated Rayborn and it clouded his judgment when it came to things. She did that for him – balanced him – pulled him up short. She didn't go along when he went too far afield. He returned a rueful glance and nodded. She was, of course, probably right.

"So…" he ventured, "any ideas?"

She thought hard and with the hangover the gears in her brain were clogged and slow. He could see the pain behind her eyes. "Let's get you back to 100% and then we'll go back there," he offered gently taking her elbow and steering her to a small basin, with towels and soap there. He never asked why she ran or where she went. He didn't judge, didn't lecture, he simply moved on and accepted that her weakness was part of her.

He poured the rest of the hot water into the basin and then stopped her before she began, "wait, honey it's too hot." He stepped outside into the blowing snow and returned with a bucket of snow – adding it carefully to achieve a reasonable temperature. The care he extended to her made her angry for no reason. His casual use of the affectation and her failure to chastise him for it chafed her further. But when she sunk her hands into the warm water the anger melted away.

He turned his back and gave the privacy to wash up without comment. She stripped off her sweater and worn shirt. She washed in the basin, using a cloth until she was presentable and then used the rest of the water to wet her hair with the intention of slicking it back in a ponytail. As she dried her face, she looked down to find her toothbrush, a clean shirt and her hairbrush on the table beside her. Crews…he thought of everything.

"What is this place?" She inquired signaling she was decent and it was okay for him to turn and face her, which he did immediately.

"First thing I bought after prison," he gestured. "This land, this place," his mind travelled somewhere in the past taking his tongue with it. She cleared her throat reminding him he'd fallen silent. He continued, "Turns out that after living in an 8x10 foot cell for so long, I didn't do well with all the space. I needed something… cozy… until I could deal with all that freedom."

It was a disclosure that shocked her speechless, but it made sense. After being confined in such a small area for so long, all that openness would have to be overwhelming. He needed to work up to having the freedoms he'd not enjoyed for so long. She'd met him four months after his release, but he never talked about those times.

It made her consider him in a different light. There were times when his Zen armor slipped and his foibles showed. He was sharing that – a private thing with her – only with her. She was pretty sure even Ted didn't know about this place or the reason for it.

She switched subject not wanting to push him. Dani respected privacy more than any other asset. Some things were yours and yours alone. "Uh….shoes?" she gestured to her feet which current only bore thick wool socks, probably his.

"I knew I forgot something," he joked with a grin. He didn't bring her shoes on purpose, so she couldn't stomp off in anger. He pointed to a pair of heavy boots by the door, "You can wear those to go outside."

"Why on earth would I want to go outside?"

"Uh…there's no plumbing in here," he explained. "The bathroom – toilet," he pointed out the window, "is over there."

She peered out the window at a small wooden shed about twenty feet away through the blowing snow and shook her head, "You have got to be fucking kidding me," she grumbled under her breath. The look on his face told her he was not.

There were times when being a guy was easier and this was one of them. It was thought that occurred to her frequently when on surveillance her male partners could easily simply slip from the car and relieve themselves behind a tree, while she could not. She slipped her feet into the large boots and felt like a child wearing her father's shoes. There were seriously oversized. She cast a backwards glance and caught Crews smiling again.

"Shut up," she ordered, but his grin remained and coaxed a wry smile from her.

"Here," he appeared beside her draping a coat over her shoulders and offering a wool cap, "it's cold out there."

"Thanks Captain Obvious," she retorted.

She opened the door and the cold took her breath away. She managed a few steps grumbling the entire way when the supreme silence and solitude permeated. She stopped half way there and looked around. The wood was a combination of tall, thin pines and short, squat, dense deep green firs. The ground beneath her was covered with pine needles, blanketed in a layer of heavy wet snow. But it was largely silent, like the world muffled. From time to time a branch would release a heavy load of snow, which fell to earth with a dull crump, but otherwise it was eerily silent.

She could imagine Crews here, alone in the wood, in the weeks following his release from prison, becoming accustomed to the sounds of the world again. If she closed her eyes she could see him; tall and thin like the pines standing in the midst of the silent wood as if he were a tree. She opened her eyes and looked up seeking the blue of the sky found in her partner's eyes. But the clouds were still present, heavy and grey. Fresh snow drifted through the air like tiny feathers. It was magical.

* * *

><p>When Dani hadn't returned in five minutes, Charlie peeked outside. There was only one set of tracks in the snow, so he waited. After ten, he set out - in just his socks. She opened the door to the outhouse and found Crews picking his way through the snow in stocking feet.<p>

"What are you doing?" she asked a hint of amusement in her voice.

"You…" he looked up, "you were gone a long time. I was….I was just," he stopped talking as his teeth chattered and he clinched his jaw to stop the shivering.

"Go back inside right now," she ordered. Even with her oversized boots, trudging through the snow she easily caught him. She clasped his hand in hers and pulled him toward the door.

"Honestly, Crews," she continued to chastise him, "I can't believe you're out here in just a t-shirt." Her ire at his patented disregard for his personal welfare in favor of her was palpable, "You could have at least put on your coat."

"You're wearing it," he confessed his lips blue from the cold.

The door shut behind them and the warmth soaked into her immediately. "Take off your socks. They are wet." She bossed him around like his mother. "Sit," she demanded and carried the basin of warm water to his feet. "Put your feet in here," he did and his teeth stopped chattered immediately. She hung up his wet socks in front of the fire and wheeled to face him.

"Why do you do that?" she bordered on shouting. "Why do you do stupid things that risk your life and health without even thinking? Why Charlie?" she beseeched.

They'd come full circle. It was the same conversation she'd wanted to have after that day in the orange grove, but he'd effectively blunted with Zen. There was nowhere to go this time. He no longer wanted to avoid it – or her.

"I love you Dani Reese," he stared at her and said the words again.

"I never asked for that," she countered.

"I can't help it," he defended. "It's not like its something I set out to do. It surprised me. I denied it for a long time, but one day I looked up and realized I couldn't imagine my life without you in it."

She bit her lip and said nothing.

His head dropped – there was nothing more he could say. He didn't want to talk her into anything; he wanted her to feel it like he did.

She inhaled as if to say something and then stopped – twice.

He looked at her expectantly, "You had to know." His voice was barely a whisper.

"I know," she said grabbing a towel and pulling his foot from the basin. She focused on drying his foot.

"You don't have to do that," he murmured as her hands rubbed his foot and her head stayed down. "Dani," he called her name. She shook him off and busied herself with the other foot. "Stop," he demanded sharply, stilling her hands with his.

She stilled and let him hold her hands between his. The moment stretched and he took the towel from her and helped her stand. He pushed the basin away with his foot and then framed her face with both hands. She made no move to flee. She drew slow steady breaths and as he bent to kiss her he said those words once more, "I love you Dani Reese."

She exhaled shakily and surrendered to what she knew they both wanted. He briefly touched her lips and her hands found their way to his face. It was not smooth like she imagined, but the furry friction there, the redness between her fingers, made her lips curve in a sly smile against his waiting lips. His expression of want was deep growl, but he restrained himself physically.

"Did you just growl at me?" she teased.

"Did I?" he wondered as he watched her eyes. There was tiredness there, pain and the aching need for the drugs, which would return with a vengeance; but he also saw wonder and joy mixed in the depths of her black eyes. "I wanna kiss you," he said breathlessly.

"Isn't that what you just did?"

"Did I?" he teased. He feinted and withdrew when she reached for his lips again. Her frustrated groan made his heart pound. He kissed her top lip and then trailed his tongue along the bottom one. Dani sucked his tongue into the hot little mouth and pulled him down into her kiss. He was lost and falling fast. The world spun and he gripped her for balance squeezing her body tightly against his chest. She broke away breathless, resting her forehead against his chin. He laid feather light kisses on her temples and ran his hands along her back under the wool sweater. He could feel her smooth skin and bent to taste the joining of her neck and shoulder. She moaned and he almost lost it right there.

He abruptly broke contact and stepped back with dizzy speed. She felt the loss of his warmth immediately. His absence after the fullness of his contact left her feeling like she was standing on the edge of a cliff. A wide chasm yawned below.

She stepped toward him and he stepped back. Two more steps followed – her forward, him back. It was their dance. Soon she would lose her nerve and step back and the moment would be over. He reached the bed sooner than he'd expected. Nowhere else to go. He glanced back and when he rejoined her, she'd covered the distance between them. She put one small hand in the middle of his chest and pushed. He fell backwards and he kept falling….


	8. Chapter 8

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER 8**

She'd come back from her adventure in the winter wonderland to find her partner fast asleep and dreaming in the overstuffed chair facing the fire. Light danced on his features. The shining reds of his hair made him seem ethereal and otherworldly – her Zen warrior. He was exhausted. She took a thin blanket from the bed and draped it over him.

She'd dawdled on the way back from the bathroom- if one could call a crude hole in wood in the freezing cold a bathroom. The blast of cold air up her backside blew away the last of the cobwebs in her brain. As she trudged through the snow in her partner's oversized boots, she again paused to listen and soak in the silence. She tipped her head back and caught snowflakes on her tongue – not something a little girl from sunny LA had many chances to try.

Though the Sierra Nevada Mountains were only a couple hours away, the Reese family always went to the beach and not the mountains. They were very different than the noisy crowded beaches of her childhood. There was peace here and truth. Not the slick plastic throwaway commercialism of the beach, but the deep, profound wisdom of stone, the quiet strength of trees and the clarity of mountain streams. She understood what drew Crews here – it was something they shared – another thing they shared. She was beginning to realize she shared far more with her quirky partner than she'd ever thought possible. Strangely, this did not trouble her as much as she thought it would. That alone made her question her sanity as she trudged back to the small wooden cabin with smoke curling from the chimney.

He did not wake when she entered, which let her know how truly tired he was. After covering him with the blanket, she began exploring the tiny one room cabin and their circumstance. There was a small rough-hewn wood table and two sturdy chairs in one corner. On the table there was a blue cooler/icebox full of snow and ice. Sunk deep in the cooler was a carton of orange juice, plastic half gallon of apple juice, several bottles of water and two Ziploc bags with ham and Swiss cheese in them. There was a plastic bag on the table with flour tortillas, a tin of coffee, a box of sugar cubes and a few Golden delicious apples and red seedless grapes in a small bowl. _Crews and his damned fruit_ she thought.

The chair in front of the fireplace was the only other seat and the remaining piece of furniture was the full size bed where she'd slept with a thick quilt covering it. Her partner was a man of simple tastes and needs. She made a ham and cheese rollup and popped a few grapes in her mouth. She made a fresh cup of coffee, put the cooler on the floor and sat at the table with a note pad and a bright blue pen and began putting her thoughts down on paper, while he partner snored softly and shifted in his sleep.

She plotted where they were when they were taken, what they were working on and where they were headed next. She listed their suspects in the current case and those pending trial in others they were slated to testify in this month. She listed all of Roman's known associates she could remember. Then at the bottom of the page she wrote two names – Jack Reese and Mickey Rayborn in large bold strokes with a question mark next to each. _Was her father a bad person or just mean? Why did Rayborn want Crews so badly?_ They were questions they didn't know the answers to. Perhaps there really were no answers – only questions - like Crews said. She worked the problem as the aching, clawing need rekindled. It wouldn't be long before she was jonesing had for another fix. Work staved off the inevitable - for now.

She turned in her chair to examine her sleeping partner. He lounged half in – half out of the oversized chair. He feet stuck out at odd angles and the blanket slid down to his waist, leaving his narrow chest covered only with a thin t-shirt. His cheeks were covered now with three or more day's growth. He'd always been so clean and lean. It was impressive how quickly his face was bearded and mustachioed, some day that talent might come in handy to make them disappear, she mused.

The beard made him appear softer somehow and covered the cuts and bruises he'd gotten in their beating. His pale lips twitched and the bottom lip was split and chapped. His eyes were hidden from her and she missed them like she missed the blue of the sky, but she let him sleep. The purple smudges under his blonde lashes were a testament to his tiredness, she wondered is she appeared as haggard as her partner, but decided it was well earned. They'd been through hell in the last week. She resettled the blanket over him and he grumbled something inaudible in reply. But he knew it was her, murmuring her name in his gravelly sleepy voice. He reached for her, trailing his hand down her arm in a gesture that was at once both comforting and intimate. She let him touch her without comment and when he drifted back to sleep she stepped away.

The only sounds in the room were the snap, crackle and pop of the fire, the scratching of her pen and the mumbled dreams of Crews – which from time to time included only one clear word – her name. She knew what that felt like. His name was often a mantra for her, but the mumbled plea off his sleepy lips still pulled at her heartstrings. She knew Crews was in her heart, he had been for some time; but she tried hard to keep that fact to herself. They were dangerously close to crossing a line neither was ready for.

He woke with a start as she added kindling to the fire.

"Nice of you to join us, sleepyhead," she commented sardonically. Beside him on a small table were a glass of apple juice and a rollup. "Go on," she coached. "Eat," she ordered.

He was still having trouble separating his dream from reality. He looked from the bed to her and back, "How'd I get here?" he wondered rubbing his eyes. "How long have I been asleep?"

Dani shrugged, "It's dark outside now." She didn't answer his first question.

He got up, stretched making him appear even taller in the low ceiling of the cabin. He slipped his boots on and stepped outside to relieve himself. She could only estimate he didn't make the walk to the bathroom because is he back in less than two minutes and shaking snow off himself. He washed his hands in the now tepid water in the basin – again looking from her to the water and back like something was amiss. He pursed his lips to ask a question and then thought better of it. His behavior amused her. She'd never seen him off balance before and it made him appear more human, more fallible – more attractive, but she quickly discarded that train of thought.

"Mind telling me why there's a couple thousand dollars in the wood pile?" she asked waiving a bindle of 100's at him.

"Actually, that's more than a couple thousand. Those are ten thousand dollars bindles," he replied. Dani dropped the money like she'd been bitten. That made him chuckle. "I was still a little angry when I got out, so I used them for kindling," he explained as he bent over, picked up and tossed the money into the fire. "I thought got rid of it all."

Dani blanched white, stared after the money in the fire and then her partner incredulous.

"It's just money, Reese," he offered, "It can't buy any of the important stuff."

"Spoken like someone who has it to burn," she shot back, "literally." She pointedly stared at the curling, blackening bills.

"Is it that important to you?" he cocked his head considering her focus.

"No," she yelped. "But you could have done a lot of good with that money," she defended.

"Like your father?"

Reese shot him dirty look. "What do you mean?"

"Blessed Sisters of Mercy?" He probed.

She shrugged and then scowled, "I don't know what the hell you're talking about."

Her anger with her father was something Charlie never completely understood, but he was about to. Reese fell silent and he returned to the tasks at hand, which including feeding his growling stomach. He practically inhaled the sandwich she'd made, drained the juice in one draught and fished an apple from the bag on the table – all without comment. He crunched into the apple loudly and sat at the table spinning her notes around and perusing them.

"You've been busy," he commented cautiously.

"Yeah, well I have this little problem," she admitted wryly smiling, "I'm a drug addict with no drugs."

"It's good you can laugh about it," he grinned gently.

'Yeah, well you're going to be sorry. You're locked in a remote cabin in the woods with me and in about eleven hours when I start climbing the walls, calling you every name in the book and generally fighting like hell to get out of here," she foretold their future, "you're gonna wish we'd never met."

"I'll never wish that," he stated emphatically. He looked at her again with that pointed stare of his. It was one part query, mixed with adoration and concern that made her body heat up without any physical contact. He seemed to know his effect on her, because as soon as her skin flushed red he stopped and smiled gently.

"We'll get through it together," he vowed. "I promise, Dani. We'll get through it."

She didn't sound as convinced, "I guess we'll see, Crews."

"What happened to Charlie?" he asked quietly holding her eyes.

"I've never called you Charlie," she objected to his assertion.

"Some day you will," he said presciently.

She arched her eyebrows in both a question and a challenge.

"Now about these question marks," he changed the subject again, holding up the paper and pointing to the names she wrote at the bottom. "Rayborn? You said that I was reaching…. And your father? Really? Your father?"

Again she shrugged noncommittally.

"Uh-uh," he said strongly, "you don't put something like this," he pointed to her father's name, "out there and then suddenly clam up."

She shook her head, but he pressed, "Dani, you owe me an explanation. Why do you think he's alive - after Roman told you he killed him? And why you think he's involved? Why you think he would do that – this….to us…well, not to me – but to you?" Crews sounded dangerously close to angry.

He crossed the room to her clasping her arms in a vice like grip, "What did he do to you?"

She shook her head and tried to shake loose, but he refused to release her.

"What Dani?" he repeated more urgently. She steadfastly refused to meet his gaze, then she stopped fighting and that was when he really got scared.


	9. Chapter 9

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER NINE**

He steeled himself and took deep breaths, willing his learned Zen to calm the well-earned raging storm inside him. His flash of anger at the possibility Dani's father harmed her simply served to potentiate his personal distaste for the man. He suddenly realized how tightly he was griping her small arms and released her sliding his hands down her arms in what he hoped was a soothing gesture, as she slid away. She didn't go far - he'd made sure she couldn't and now he felt she'd feel trapped - by him. Her whole affect showed defeat, shame and he desperately wanted to know what brought his strong, resilient partner to this. He needed to give her time and space – she wanted to tell him what Jack Reese had done - to her.

She sat at the small table with her head in her hands concentrating on how she would make this disclosure. She wanted to tell him – he deserved to know – knowing might actually explain some of the things she did. But she knew what Charlie would think, how he would feel; she feared what he might do. She pressed the palms of her hands against her temples. She felt him cross behind her and take the seat opposite. She could feel him staring at her, breathing in her space. He distracted her and unnerved her.

"You're not making this any easier…" she told him through clenched teeth.

He sighed heavily and felt his warm hands close over hers. He slowly drew her hands away from her face. She raised her face and met his eyes. The concern there was like a warm, safe bed. "Honey, you can tell me anything," he said tenderly. He would not judge her, he'd accept her, defend her, protect her and she knew it without question. Crews loved her unconditionally.

"He hit me…" she began hesitantly, "at first a little, then as I became a teenager - a lot," she continued. This part he may have suspected but it was the first time she'd told him with certainty. His expression did not change; he looked expectantly at her and nodded indicating she should continue. "It may not come as a surprise, but I was kinda willful as a teenager and had a smart mouth."

"You still are…" he ventured smiling softly, "willful and smart."

"Yeah," she mirrored his smile for a fraction of a second, "but I didn't deserve what he did. No kid does," she said darkly.

"Dani?" He couldn't hold back the question. It sprang forth suddenly like a jack in the box, so fast it surprised them both. "He didn't touch you did he?" The contempt in his tone was unmistakable.

She answered him directly and firmly, "No."

"But…" Crews hinted. He knew there was more – with Reese there was always more.

"But…one of his SWAT buddies did. I was fourteen. It was a barbeque in our backyard. I was a kid - playing in the pool, stealing sips of beer and this guy from his squad…. Well, he was drunk. He grabbed me, you know? Felt me up – he was really drunk." She gritted out the rest before she lost her nerve. Crews eyes' were a hazy mix of blue and green. He projected both sympathy and anger. "So…I told him. I stupidly thought my dad - the big, bad SWAT commander would do something…" she sounded small and sad.

"He didn't believe you," Crews told the end of her tale. He looked up at the ceiling and squeezed his eyes shut.

"Nope," she popped quickly, biting back the pain and humiliation. "It actually gets worse," she bragged sadistically. "Said I was a little tease, running around in shorts and bikini top. Said I wanted attention, that I encouraged it and that if I got scared then I'd better change my ways," she laughed bitterly.

He mouthed "son of a bitch" under his breath, but the room was so quiet she still heard him.

"But I didn't," she confessed, "I didn't change my ways. I was fourteen then and I just got worse. You know the rest – the drugs, the alcohol, the men…" her voice broke as the emotional dam was breached.

"Dani," his voice was low and dangerous, "You didn't do anything wrong. If he didn't defend you - didn't kick that guy's ass – didn't nearly kill him - for touching you, for looking at you like that….. That's….I don't even know what that is… Except to say how cowardly that is… he is."

He collected himself as the rich deep emotion bled into his tone, "But you? You didn't do anything wrong, honey. You were a little kid. You deserved to be protected, to be cherished – you still do," when he finished she realized he was still holding her hands in his. "You still do," he repeated tenderly.

"Every thing since then has been about that," she explained, "or so the shrinks tell me," the bitterness was present in her voice, which sounded brittle and tinny. "The drugs, the liquor, the men," she listed her many sins, "it's all connected Crews." She laughed at her play on words with his Zen. He didn't.

"You are still trying to punish yourself for something that wasn't your fault," he stated her dilemma succinctly.

"Yeah," she sounded utterly defeated, "yep, that's my life in a nutshell. I never got past that sunny day in our backyard when I was fourteen and innocent."

He rubbed her hands between his and sought her eyes. "Just because he didn't protect you - doesn't mean you don't deserve protecting." He told her something she already knew clinically but had a hard time believing.

"Heard it…about six hundred times, but knowing it and believing it are two totally different things," she confessed.

"And no one you ever met made you believe it?"

"You did," she told him and her eyes said it was the truth. "That day in the orange grove with Roman, you did."

And there it was again that line they didn't cross. The one they walked right up to the edge of – leaned over, bent and stepped around - but never, ever crossed. It was shimmering in the light before him. His love and his belief could heal her, save her and she might be what he'd been looking for all along, but he had to have the courage to risk his heart again - to be in the world and of it, not apart from it – for her.


	10. Chapter 10

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER TEN**

"Dani…" he began in a tone that told her he was walking backwards (again).

"Say it again. I dare you," she pressed. He was in her business and it was time for him to ante up and put his money where his mouth was. She was tired of his empty Zen, she needed a reality she could sink her teeth into. "Say what you said to me when I woke up," she taunted now angry at his cautiousness.

"You know that I love you," he reasoned.

"Prove it," she challenged. "You and me Crews. Right here, right now. No more bullshit."

"If I thought you meant that…. If I thought that it was really you talking," he defended, "not the drugs, not the need," he shot back with emotion leaving his thought unfinished. "It's not real and I need to know it's real between us."

"How're you gonna know Crews? What's some reincarnated giant panda gonna tell you if this is real?" she testily retorted. She had blown past red and was starting to see nothing but black. The need she'd sublimated with mundane tasks came roaring back. Her head pounded, her insides itched and she wanted to stop the suffering, but didn't know how.

"Cause you can't 'know' – no one 'knows.' You just risk it and if it works – then it works…" she spun down a tiny fraction as she finished. "You take such incredible risks and then this…." she spat at him in contempt, "You're a fucking coward, Crews."

She pushed away from the table, making the chair fall over behind her. She looked around for the boots determined to stomp off, but they were still firmly on her partner's feet and then it dawned on her.

"You didn't bring my shoes on purpose," she challenged.

He gave her what she already knew, "I didn't bring your shoes on purposes."

She still marched to the door and flung it open and for half a second he really thought she'd strike out anyway – she was just that stubborn, that willful. . But half a foot of snow lay on the ground outside and she wasn't that far-gone – not yet.

She wheeled and glared at him. "Fuck you, Crews. Fuck you and your god damned Zen. If you aren't going to help me, then why all this?" she flung her arm around at his cabin. "Why'd you bring me here?"

"What you're suggesting will not help you. If we do this," he said gesturing between them with his finger, "this is not a one time kinda thing. I won't be that for you, no matter how bad you think you need it now. It would be a mistake."

She shut the door and leaned against it considering his words. She chewed on her lip and turned his words over in her head. When she responded the anger was still there, but so was curiousity, "then what kinda thing is it then Crews?"

"It's a forever kinda thing, Dani," he said softly, gently reaching for her.

"No," she shouted and jerked away from him. "You don't get to do that."

"Yes…I do." he said in an unflinching tone. He spoke his demand as he reached for her again, "and only I do. For me to love you – you have to let me Dani," he sighed heavily and tried to explain his reluctance to give her what they both wanted.

"Honey, I won't fail you. I will always believe you and I will never let anyone hurt you. But this isn't something I can do on my own, you have to help me, " he patiently explained. "You know how they say you have to let the right one in?" he tried to reason with the wildness in her eyes. "I'm that one, Dani."

The wildness was still there, but she stilled. He could see the pain behind her eyes.

"I never listen to them anyway," she groused.

"Then listen to me," he beseeched her.

"The guy who stole my shoes?" she grumbled as her anger ebbed from her taking her strength with it.

"Yeah, that guy," he cautiously approached her and pulled her into his chest.

She came willingly, mumbling into his chest, "I hurt so bad inside, Charlie. In ways I can't begin to describe and sometimes I don't think it will ever stop."

"When I said I wouldn't let anyone hurt you…I meant including you," he vowed.

She pushed away and stepped back, "but this isn't over," she capitulated but placed conditions on her surrender. "When I'm well enough, thinking straight, we're going to have this talk again, and you're gonna stop stalling. Deal?" she bargained.

Her outstretched hand shook – but whether it was from fear, cold or withdrawal he could not tell.

"Believe me – there is nothing I want more," he vowed solemnly taking her hand. "Now let's get you to bed," he said drawing her into the corner of the bed that held the bed. She gave him a strange look but went anyway as he led her to the corner of the small room.

She considered that her whole world had become this one room shack in a secluded wood and the tall man leading her some place she didn't have the courage to go alone. It was like nothing and nowhere else existed for them – and at the moment it didn't. All her other problems were distant, hazy and unimportant. Crews was a blanket that muffled the white noise of the rest of her life; he always did that for her – crystallized and clarified things for her and insulated her from things that would cause her pain. He was like looking at the world through deep, clear, cold water – the color of his eyes even reminded her of it sometimes.

Once she was tucked in, he stoked the fire, tossed out the water in the basin, cleaned up a bit and settled in the overstuffed chair facing the fire. But Dani wasn't asleep, she tossed and turned and sighed and grumbled. She was fighting her demons and they were winning. He listened as she wrestled, but was surprised when her quiet tone reached his ears.

"Charlie?"

"Uh-huh," he grunted a sleepy reply.

"Could you…uh…" she lacked the will to ask for what she wanted.

"Sit with you awhile," he finished.

"Yeah," she surrendered softly, admitting her need for him.

He approached in the shadow and lowered himself gently beside her. "Do you realize this will be the third, no… fourth night we've spent together?" he joked. "I think this qualifies as the longest relationship I've had in the past fifteen years."

"You mean not counting Ted?" She chuckled lightly.

"Oh, so now you wanna make prison jokes?" He smiled gathering her to his chest.

He hadn't even kissed her yet and she was still the closest thing to heaven that he knew. Dani curled her hand against his shoulder and he covered it with his to keep her warm. They lay still until the fire burned down and somewhere in the night both fell asleep.


	11. Chapter 11

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER ELEVEN**

She kicked off the covers as the night sweats hit and he covered her back up. He held her through night as she shivered through chills. Her heart raced at times and then she'd fall into a deep sleep battling nightmares as she fought off effects of withdrawal. It wasn't as severe because she hadn't been using long or much, it was more psychological than physical. He held her still as she fidgeted and talked nothingness in soothing tones to calm her down. She finally fell into a deep untroubled sleep in the wee hours of the morning. The worst over, he brushed a few stray hairs from her cheek and let himself relax. It was several hours until morning.

"Hey," Dani said groggily trying to wake her sleeping partner to stir the fire and add more wood. It was nearing dawn and bitterly cold. He simply hugged her tighter and sunk his face into the space between her ear and shoulder inhaling deeply. He hadn't judged or derided, even when she wrestled with him, cursed at him and sought to flee the security of his arms - he'd held her close and kept her safe. It seemed to be a role he wanted, not one he was forced into. He chose her for all her sins and problems. It wasn't logical – he could have anyone, but Crews wanted her.

It didn't however keep him from completely ignoring her when he wanted to – like now. She wanted to get up and use the bathroom, but not bad enough to endure that cold walk to the outhouse, so she stilled and tried to return to sleep.

She found herself appreciating their closeness. His hands found purchase on her body in ways that were intimate without being overtly sexual. He was gentle and subtle in ways she never expected. Her curves fit against the lines of his body and everywhere he touched her was warm. She experimented in aligning herself more completely with him and for a moment believed the lie that it was just for warmth. But as she turned to face him, his grip tightened and their bodies lined up in a way that communicated just how badly they both wanted to be one. Her leg slipped between his as he hooked an arm over her waist and tugged her against him. Her arms went around his waist and found their way up his back to his shoulder blades. Her face was pressed against his chest and the uniquely masculine smell of him permeated her senses. He buried his lips in her hair and once again murmured the words he couldn't seem to stop saying, "love you Dani."

Her response was a whispered, "why?" that she knew he wouldn't answer. Even awake he would simply shrug off the question or quote some inane Zen witticism. But love her he did, he said it with more than words. Hundreds of wordless gestures, the sacrifices he made and continued to make, the acceptance he gave even her worst weaknesses all shouted it. She finally gave into the fact it wasn't likely to change. Charlie Crews gave new definition to the word stubborn. If he loved her, that wasn't likely to change.

She didn't think she deserved someone like him; but she knew she needed him. Her needs were more physical, but his were deeper – he wanted more than she was sure she could give him. But Crews' steadfast patience and gentleness would stabilize her in moments of fury and need. She wondered what she provided for him, but found herself turning into the idea of him, just as she had with her body, molding herself into the cracks and crevice becoming inseparable from her tall Quixotic partner.

It had been a long time since she'd had the courage to love someone – longer for him, but he seemed to have lost his fear of pain, of death, of loss – it was burnt away from him in prison. But she knew he still had it – fear, buried under all that Zen. It was the reason he pulled away from what they both wanted. He was as fragile as he looked – a cautiousness that was earned, buried under a layer of ice cold Zen.

She wanted to melt that ice and see what lay underneath, but it involved risk for both of them. She carefully tested the strength of his resolve as she placed a kiss on his collarbone and nuzzled her face under his chin. Her name came to her as a grumbled sleeping warning, but she pressed harder kissing then raking her teeth lightly across the delicate strap muscle of his neck. His entire body tensed in anticipation.

This time he warned her more audibly with a chastising tone in his voice as his body betrayed him. His hands moved without thought into her hair. He rolled them together as a unit onto her back. He held her under him and his eyes were open and a vibrant blue. No sign of sleep remained in them and they were dark with lust. "Dani," he breathed losing the battle against his body and hers. He knew they should wait, but he clearly didn't want to.

She smiled at him, dark eyes shining in the night. There was no need there for drugs, just want - of him. She reached up to him and kissed his bottom lip. His breath caught and his hands roamed. He caught himself and reached away instead grabbing a fistful of sheet and raising himself away from her.

"We shouldn't," he gritted as she shredded his self control.

"Why?"

"You know damned well why," his exasperation was palpable.

"Why won't you touch me?" she demurred coyly as her hands travelled lightly down his torso. He was torn. To arrest her hands he had to sink into her supple body, but that would be impossible to resist. He shook his head trying to clear it. She undid him.

"I can't," he protested.

"All evidence to the contrary," she teased.

"Dani," he dropped his head to her chest. She smelled so good, she felt so good. "You don't understand," he countered.

"So tell me," she dared him.

"If I give in to what I want," he took a deep breath to steady himself and her hands left his body and traveled to his head. Her fingers threaded through his hair, it was longer now than he liked, but it gave her the leverage she needed to turn his face up to within inches of hers.

"To what we both want," she reminded him. "What'll happen Charlie?" She covered the distance to his lips and kissed him. It wasn't aggressive like he expected – she was sweet and tender and that threw him.

"I won't be able to let go," he explained in exquisite agony.

"I don't want you to let go," she promised him her heart with her dark eyes shining in the stillness of the small room. He released the sheet and his hand smoothed the sheet until he reached her back. Then he slipped under the small of her back and pulled her under him fully. They were lined up for more than just kissing, but he hadn't even done that yet.

"I wanna kiss you," he repeated the words from his dream.

She stopped and withdrew. She was giving him permission to lead, to drive, to control. She was giving him more than her body. "Are you sure? Really sure, Dani?" he wondered aloud. She didn't trust herself to speak, so she simply nodded and ran her thumb across his bottom lip.

The first time he kissed her – he kept his eyes open watching her reaction. She closed her eyes and surrendered to his kiss. He broke, stroked her face and descended again to deepen the kiss. His tongue sought entrance and she opened for him. Their heat built until they no longer noticed the cold. They were both fully clothed and he'd nothing more than kiss her and Charlie couldn't remember ever being happier.

"We can't do this here," he let her down gently with the promise of more.

Her dark eyes held no anger, just a question, so he told her.

"The things I want to do to you, with you," his voice deepened, "I need more room, more time. I promise you," he vowed, "we will be worth the wait." She looked quizzically at him and nodded.

They disengaged and she rolled away satisfied in the fact that they would happen, but on his terms. It reinforced her feeling that his still waters ran quite deep and he had been badly damaged by his ex's betrayal. He wanted so much to be together, but resisted out of fear. She knew his fear as completely as her own. He pulled her against him and draped an arm over her. He settled besides her sinking his nose into the hair at the base of her neck, inhaling the scent of her deeply.

"I want you more than I can remember wanting anyone – ever," he told her the depths of his desire. She snorted a short laugh. He had the patience of a saint when she clearly did not. "No, you really have no idea how badly I want you and for how long I've thought about this, about us," he whispered in her exposed ear as if someone might overhear his confession.

"Oh, I have some idea," she laughed. "If you hype this and aren't any good I'm gonna kick your ass Crews." His palm was on her shoulder as he quickly turned her into his body and locked her in searing kiss. He burnt away any stray thoughts she had as he kissed her with an abandon she didn't know he possessed. She had to push him away to come up for air.

This time he smiled wordlessly and got up to add wood to the fire. He wasn't joking – together they were going to be amazing and for that she could wait. When he returned she wrapped his arm around her and snuggled against him before returning to sleep. The need for the drug was great, but the need for this man was greater. It occupied her entirely. If he wanted to wait, she could wait for him. He might even teach her patience she thought as she heard him sigh contentedly just before she fell back asleep.

"We need to go home," he told her yawning, "we'll leave in the morning. There's this diner I know that make blueberry pancakes with fresh blueberries on the way. I love blueberries," he continued rambling on long after she'd stopped listening in classic Crews fashion. _Him and his fruit_ - were her last thoughts and she fell asleep smiling at Charlie being Charlie.


	12. Chapter 12

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER TWELVE**

"Where are they?" The older man demanded.

"Both their cells are off," the burly man nervously briefed his findings, "but the car's GPS puts them here," he pointed to the green area of the map, southwest of the populated areas.

"That can't be right. That's in the middle of nowhere," the elder man said tersely.

"It's the John Muir Wilderness," the younger man informed. "Our sources say Crews owns a small homestead out there. There's nothing on it but a rustic cabin on an unimproved road. We think that's where they went."

"Oh, so that's what you...THINK," the boss caustically tested. He stared hard and let the comment permeate - emphasizing the fact that the young man was there for his brawn not his mental acumen. "What did I tell you apes about thinking?"

"It's our best lead," the young man defended boldly. "It's our only lead," he admitted after enduring another pointed stare.

"Fine," the man acquiesced. "Take two men – go pursue your 'lead'. Pray that you are right," the man glowered threatening. "Find them - I'll reward your ingenuity and confidence. Fail and I'll punish your hubris," he warned.

The young man made his choices carefully. The mountains required a good wheelman. Snows and the roads made things there treacherous. He selected a seasoned car thief, all of 19 years old, but who could drive anything with wheels. In that quick, lean boy's hands, a car was a 2000 lb bullet. The other man he selected was a quiet but effective killer, a small man with a powerful appetite for pain who wasn't afraid of violence. Crews was dangerous, if came down to that – he wanted someone who wasn't afraid to kill the Detective if that's what it took.

The drive took them hours. Normally on a long drive, people talk to pass the time. These men did not. The driver drove, the killer planned and slept, the man in charge worried about his future and if he had one.

The quiet crew stopped at diner in the mountains for gas and a meal. It was dawn and the mountains were still and quiet. They sat at a back booth and ate in silence, but as the waitress moved to warm their coffee the man in charge covered his cup. They didn't have time for this – they had to find the tall red haired man and his foot shorter raven-haired partner. He asked for the bill and was standing to put his coat on when a black Maserati pulled into the space in front on the booth. Crews and his partner climbed from the car. The man grinned – luck was smiling on him and he would be rewarded.

"You know what? Changed my mind," he told the waitress. "I do want another cup," he sunk back in the booth smiled and waited.

She seated the Detectives on the other end of the diner and took their order. On her way to the kitchen the young man nodded at her to come over. He pulled a crisp $100 bill from his wallet. "This is for tying up your booth, but my friends and I would like to wait a bit – till the sun gets higher and roads get better before we leave," he lied.

The waitress shrugged and pocketed the $100 and turned to the help her new customers who sat less than 75 feet from their pursuers completely unaware.

The detectives looked tired. He was bearded and his hair unkempt as though someone had run his or her fingers through it – _probably her_ the man mused. Her hair was in a tight ponytail, slunk low on her neck. There were dark circles under both their eyes. They both looked as if they could use a shower, but they looked happy – so happy they didn't perceive the danger right under their noses.

* * *

><p>The blueberry pancakes were everything Charlie promised. He had them put whipped cream on his and in her coffee. He smiled at her across the table and held her hand until the food came. His blue eyes beamed mischief and mirth. They had weathered a tough storm. Their future together awaited. It made them both giddy with anticipation. They'd return to the city and to work, but neither of those things scared her with him at her side. They were secure in their tiny bubble of two.<p>

It wasn't until they left the diner and the small man shoved a gun roughly in her back as they approached the car that the bubble burst. Something about the small man's eyes made Charlie know he welcomed the chance to hurt someone, he enjoyed the prospect of them resisting. It was a terrifying look he'd seen in prison in the amoral and sadistic. Dani was prepared to resist, but he shook his head no. She bristled at the man's closeness but did not fight. A look passed between them and she acquiesced to his judgment.

"Someone wants to see you two," the leader said. "Get in," he motioned to the SUV.

"You," he instructed the small killer, "follow us in their car." He took Charlie's keys and once the Detectives were both inside, sat behind them in the SUV. "Be smart. No one has to get hurt," he told the detectives as he watched each examine the situation looking for an opportunity to exploit. Tension and potential energy was present in their bodies.

Crews willed himself to relax. They were outnumbered and outgunned. He needed to wait for the right opportunity.

"Easy," Crews coached, "it'll be okay."

"You mean like last time?" She argued.

"Not like last time," he vowed under his breath, "I'm not gonna let them hurt you."

"He just wants to talk to you," the leader explained. "Ride quietly and we'll have no problems, but if you try anything I am authorized to put a bullet in you – provided you can still talk when we get there." At this comment the man grinned, confident in his supremacy.

Dani scowled wickedly and Charlie took her hand in his again, "easy," he repeated. She held for him – only for him would she make such a gesture. He controlled her as completely as fear for her controlled him. It was as deadly and dangerous as it was touching – each was the other's Achilles heel.


	13. Chapter 13

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER THIRTEEN**

They were in the white tiled room again. This time they cuffed her to a pipe – one she hadn't even noticed was there before - but she was certain it was the same room. Then they made her watch as they beat him. He held her eyes willing her his strength in the clear blue calm there. She found she couldn't look away, so she ignored the blows and focused only on his eyes. She refused to give them the satisfaction of seeing her cry, drawing on the strength in him to fill herself with resolve. It was something the man watching on closed circuit was not expecting and it infuriated him, but he knew the true test was yet to come. _What would Crews do when they left him and moved to the girl?_

Three men worked on Charlie for a good ten minutes and he bore it like they were throwing flower petals on him from a high window. When his captors stopped to rest, he dropped exhausted to his knees. He shook his head and then managed to smile at her, blood in the spaces between his bright white teeth. He amazed her.

"This is useless," the voice from the speaker pronounced, "bring me the girl."

That got a reaction from Crews, "NO," he roared, rising to his feet. "You leave her alone," he spat blood as his anger became unbearable, uncontainable. His rage made every man in the room step back, only Dani attempted to move toward him.

"The girl," the man repeated dully. His men moved slowly, but Crew menaced and none were eager for another unexpectedly crushed windpipe and the slow agony of suffocation.

He was lit from within as the tall red haired man glowered, "Touch her and you die." His fierceness and his eye contact made them look away. They were all strong men, but he was unbelievably threatening them and having an effect.

The man in the room watching it unfold on close circuit camera admired Crews once again. He was the right man for them. Time to make the deal.

"Are you ready to listen to me Detective?" the voice asked.

"Let her go and you can do what you want to me," Crews bargained.

"You bargain with what you do not have Detective," the man laughed. "Why would I do that? I already have you both."

"What do you want from us?" Crews questioned, his anger now in check.

"Not her, just you son. We want you to join us," the man said. "Just become who you are supposed to be," the man explained patiently.

"I do that? And she can go?" Charlie questioned.

"Yes," the man's voice sounded supremely confident. He had won. Crews wanted his partner safe, he would agree to anything that promised that. No one was ever truly safe, but the man accepted that it was the promise Crews needed - to make his deal with the devil.

Charlie turned and looked at her; she could see it in his eyes, just like with Roman.

"No," she told him forcefully.

He nodded and she knew he was going to do it anyway, no matter the cost to himself. He approached her; no one moved to stop him. "Keys," he demanded. Someone gave him a handcuff key and he released her. The room was silent as a tomb as her dropped the cuffs to the floor and they clattered loudly.

"Crews," she warned. "Don't do this," she whispered to him.

"Go home," he demanded. "I'll meet you there when I'm done."

"Charlie, please," she whispered tightly.

"Have I ever failed to keep a promise to you?" Have I ever not come out alive?"

She shook her head because she didn't trust her voice.

"Car keys," Crews demanded.

"We'll take her home Detective," the silky smooth voice offered over the intercom.

"No deal," Crews stood firm. "She leaves now, alone or I'm done talking," he boldly stated. The men looked at each unsure, then one of them looked at the camera.

"What do we do boss?"

"Give him what he wants," came the terse reply. Crews was beaten, but not broken, not by a long shot. He still commanded respect.

"She'll know where we are," one of the men pointed out. "She'll call the cops."

"No matter – we own the cops. Hell, we are the cops…." The voice from the intercom laughed dryly. "Besides if Detective Reese wants her partner back alive, she'll go home and wait for him - as instructed. Anything else and she'll be identifying his body," the man stated his terms.

The concerned man dropped the Maserati keys into Crews' waiting palm.

"I won't go," Dani defended. "I won't leave you," she bit her lip to stave off the hot tears welling behind her eyes.

"Yes," he leaned close and kissed her cheek gently careful not to touch her in any other way. "Yes, you will and I will come for you later," he held her eyes until she nodded in agreement. Then before he stepped back he pressed forward along her cheek, so his lips were against her ear and spoke the words again only for her ears, "I love you Dani Reese."

He pressed the keys into her hands and gently prodded, "go."

She risked one look back on her walk out into the bright sun with her target being Crews black car. She saw him being forced into the handcuffs he'd just gotten her out of. Shades of that day in the orange grove flashed before her as once again his eyes followed her. He kept his head and eyes above the fray mouthing, "go," inaudibly. And she did.

The tears came as soon as the door to the fast sleek car shut. She turned the engine over and it sparked to life with a roar not unlike that of its master. She navigated away from this house of pain - trying to do as Crews commanded – trying to get home. Home was his house, his bed, wherever he would go when and if they released him. So it was there she went to the mansion of marble on the high hill.


	14. Chapter 14

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER FOURTEEN**

When Ted heard the Maserati's throaty growl, he wandered from the kitchen toward the front door. Charlie had been absent for the past several days, it wasn't 'that' unusual, but he didn't call either and Charlie was usually more courteous. It just made Ted curious what his friend had been up to, but he was about to find out more than he wanted to.

The door opened and the dark form of a very bedraggled looking Dani Reese appeared clutching the Maserati keys. She looked unkempt, which wasn't a look he'd seen on the young woman before. She also looked as though she'd been crying – which Ted had never known Charlie's partner to do. Even when kidnapped by Roman last fall she'd kept her wits about her and her emotions in check as she delivered the terse, almost angry message on tape that made Charlie Crews morph back into the hard, dangerous man he remembered from prison instead of the happy go lucky Zen detective cloaked in a sunshine shield.

Something was seriously wrong and Ted had a tendency to state the obvious as a question, "Where's Charlie?"

"They have him," she said scowling darkly. Her movement spoke of stiffness and a pain Ted remembered from his own torments in the days before he fell under the protective umbrella of Charlie Crews. Someone had hurt the young woman; presumably the people who still had Crews.

"Who?"

"I don't know," her frustration was poorly concealed.

"Where?"

"I can't say," her responses were clipped in either anger or pain; he wasn't sure which.

"You…you can't say or you don't know?" Ted pressed. Charlie was, after all, his best – perhaps his only friend.

"They," she drew attention to the word, "say they'd kill him if I told anyone." This wasn't technically true, but she thought it was close enough to get the concerned man to shut up.

"We should call the police," Ted offered helpfully.

"No," the young woman snapped. "No police," she demanded and stared hard until he acquiesced.

"Right, no…cops are bad," Ted agreed a bit shocked at her reaction to police, since she was one. "But we should do something shouldn't we?"

Dani walked away without answering. Charlie did that sometimes too. In that way they were very much alike. She climbed the stairs with soreness and pain apparent in her every step. Nothing was up those stairs but Charlie's bedroom – so Ted concluded much had changed while he was not paying attention.

"Uh….Detective," he risked another question, "are we gonna do something?"

"Yes," Dani hissed. "I'm going to take a shower - alone."

He was a bit offended that she added the qualification. He never thought or looked at her like that. Ted knew long before anyone else that Dani Reese was Charlie's girl or that she should be if the two of them would stop denying their reliance on one another. They reminded him of a joke someone told him once about how porcupines mated – very carefully. He wondered about the sanity of such a liaison, but it seemed destined to happen and only he seemed to see it for the longest time.

"Okay…okay, well I'll just wait," he stammered. "If you need something…" he knew the rest need not be said because she was out of earshot anyway. "Crap…." he said mostly to himself.

* * *

><p>"What do you want?" Crews demanded of the disembodied voice of his captor.<p>

"Just a simple demonstration of your allegiance and your obedience when the time comes," the man spoke calmly. "You will do what we ask without question and in time there will be more for you," the man measured out the terms.

"That's it! That keeps her safe?" Crews interrupted questioning.

"Yes, son," the voice lied with laughter behind it.

"How can I know you'll keep to your word?"

There was a pause that Crews interpreted as laughter although no sound came from the speaker. "You can't. What choice do you have really? Haven't we already taken everything you loved from you once? Do you really think we won't do it again?"

The amorality of the statement and rationale made Charlie's skin crawl, but he couldn't argue with the logic. He chewed on his decision. _Reject it and place Reese in danger, accept and perhaps lessen that danger – for a while_, but she remained in danger as long as she remained with him. It seemed his life was destined to be about difficult choices.

"Come-on, son," the voice coaxed, "we all know you've done much worse things with less provocation," he taunted Charlie. "That guard? It was never tied to you, but we all know what you did… and the way you dispatched the Russian? You have a genuine talent," the voice sounded impressed. So they knew his past, his secrets, his demons and his fearsome talents.

Charlie nodded his agreement indicating acceptance – or a lack of options.

"We will let you know when your services are needed by a text that says call the group," the man explained the terms of Crews' deal with the devil. "You'll be given a burner phone number, so don't try to trace it, son. Just do as we ask and no further demonstration of your loyalty will be needed. When the time comes you'll be invited to meet the group."

Charlie stared at the closed circuit camera memorizing every detail of the room. He committed the makes and models of everything he saw to memory trying to hold onto a detail that would give him a clue to his tormentor's identity, then he pressed for more. "Who are you?

"You can know yet, but if you are patient and follow the rules you will know," the voice promised. "Some day you will know everything," the voice cryptically alluded to a future Charlie didn't want.

"You can't know everything," Charlie muttered to himself.

One of the nameless men caught the comment and his eyebrow arched. Charlie saw it – a seam he could exploit. There was daylight between at least some of these men and their masters. Just as with Roman's men, many were there because they couldn't get out. Given the choice, some would choose different. He noted the appearance of the man who understood his comment.

"That's it. Go home to your partner, Detective." And with that Crews was summarily dismissed; beaten but not bowed, battered but not broken and more determined than ever than he would not be shackled to a cause not his own.


	15. Chapter 15

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER FIFTEEN**

Dani focused on simple tasks to keep her mind off the worry that gnawed at her gut. She turned on the shower – as hot as she thought she could stand it. She stripped off her clothes with no thought to what she'd wear afterwards. She stepped into the steam and began to scrub four days grime off herself. She washed her hair – twice. But the steamy shower just gave her time to ponder the danger to her partner. The last time he'd pulled something like this – he had no plan beyond getting her away from Roman. No plan to save himself – he'd escaped by luck and his quick reflexes. Would that be enough to save him this time?

She left even though she didn't want to – for that she felt no regret. She recognized was more of a hindrance than a help to him. Unarmed, against six burly men, she was the equivalent of a five year old. She could do nothing useful except make him take stupid chances. She made him weak – his concern for and love of her was something they used against him. Without her in danger, his wits would be sharper, his balance more complete – but it didn't prevent her from feeling guilty – and from worrying. Something she thought she'd given up, along with caring was worry. But now fear clawed at her – fear for him.

She stepped from the shower, refocusing on tasks; towel drying her hair and running his comb through it. She wiped the mirror and examined herself. Dark shadows under her eyes matched the purple smudges on her partner's pale face. She looked around wrapped in a huge towel for something to wear. His pale blue dress shirt lay on the floor in his closet, something discarded in haste before this adventure began – what now seemed like a week ago – maybe it was. She'd lost so much time she didn't know. She slid into the discarded shirt and it still smelled of him.

Her eyes strayed to his oversized bed rumpled and she could make out the shape his sleeping form left in the bedding when he last rested there. She placed herself into his spot in his bed and imagined she could feel his warmth there as if he just left. She felt every bit Goldilocks in his oversized shirt and his oversized bed the sensation and thought of which made her smile slightly as sleep overtook her.

* * *

><p>Another car stopped in front of the mansion, Ted noticed from the window of his apartment over the garage. It was a police car, an unmarked sedan. A man stepped from the car and ran a hand through a mop of hair no policeman should really have. This man Ted recognized as Charlie's boss and his partner's illicit lover.<p>

_Maybe she'd changed her mind about calling the cops,_ he thought. Nope, on second thought, Dani Reese didn't seem like the kinda woman who changed her mind once she'd made it up.

The man's face bore resignation and fear as he rounded the car and closed on the house. He knocked twice lightly and rang the bell, then he just went in. Maybe something bad had befallen Charlie and he was here to break bad news. Ted decided he needed to be in the mansion for whatever was going to happen next because this was not a good visit.

Tidwell stood in the foyer listening and the house was eerily silent, but he made out the sound of footsteps coming from behind him. "Oh, good…you're the uh…that guy," he stumbled trying to define Ted's relationship with Charlie and failed as most people did.

"Ted. Ted Early," he said offering his hand.

"Right," Tidwell looked nervous. "Uh, where's Crews?"

Ted didn't want to give away anything so he shrugged.

"His car is in the drive, so he's here right?" Tidwell reasoned.

"Not at the moment," Ted remained cagey and aloof.

"I need to talk to Dan…Detective Reese. She's with him right?" Tidwell struggled for grasp of the facts.

"Uh… no," Ted reluctantly admitted. "She's here – upstairs." He pointed to Charlie's bedroom.

"Yeah, I know they are a thing. I got it, but this she needs to know," Tidwell sounded fearful and yet annoyed. "What's she doing up there?"

Again Ted shrugged. Tidwell began to climb the stair cautiously. Ted relented partly because he felt sorry for the man and partly because he didn't want Dani to be surprised and shouted, "She went up there to take a shower about an hour ago." He figured that should serve to warn her she was about to have company and let the Captain know to announce his presence. It seemed a good compromise to Ted. Tidwell disappeared around the bend in the stairwell and Ted concluded if he heard no gunshots in the next few moments - things would be okay.

Tidwell pushed open the door to Crews bedroom and saw Dani asleep in the bed, looking for all intents like she'd been swallowed by it. She looked so small and childlike sleeping peacefully that he didn't want to wake her, but she needed to know what he'd come to tell her. He cleared his throat twice before resorting to calling her name – loudly.

She sat up quickly, still very sleepy and she eyed him suspiciously, "Why are you here?" she quickly shot the comment at him.

"I have some news," he ventured.

"About Crews?" her heart leapt into her throat.

"Uh…no, about your father," Tidwell responded now unsure what the hell was going on. He wanted to ask her about Crews but was not past the fact that less than week ago the dark haired beauty was his girl.

"What about him? Is he dead?" She didn't seem upset by the idea he might be.

"No, he's very much alive," Tidwell explained. "He just walked into the precinct and surrendered himself. Says he knows all about the Bank of LA robbery and wants to turn himself in. Says he needs protection – from who he won't say, but…." He sputtered to a stop as Dani cocked her head and looked at him oddly.

"Dani…" he started down the road his heart wanted to, "what happened?"

She said nothing and simply glared at him.

"So, you and Crews just…." He tried again.

"Yes," she closed the door in his face. "Me and Crews. And you need to leave."

He was being thrown out and it riled him, "You know you could be a little nicer. I came here as a courtesy. Not like you and your partner showed me any," the snideness and pain crept into his voice.

She sighed and stopped the glare. He waited and she gave him what she wanted - closure. "I'm sorry, Kevin. I never loved you and I'm sorry if I led you to believe I did – I could. I can't."

"Do you love him?"

She shrugged noncommittally. That wasn't his business – she hadn't even told Crews that yet and she certainly wasn't going to tell him.

"Then tell me this…. " Tidwell asked a fair question – one that deserved answering, "what is it about him?" She thought hard, stared at her hands barely protruding from the rolled of sleeves of his shirt and then gave Tidwell the truth he deserved.

"All my life I've felt like I was solving a puzzle but I was missing a piece," she explained first softly to herself and the more surely as the rightness of what she was saying sunk in. "Crews is that missing piece. He always has been."

Tidwell was silent and looked at his feet for what seemed like a long time before changing the subject. "What about your dad?"

"Find out what he knows, I guess," she offered – a cop first, a daughter second.

"I know that – that's my job, but what about you?" he asked carefully.

"I'll call my mom and let her know he's alive," she told him. "Beyond that I don't know what I'll do. I need to…."

"Talk to Crews?" Tidwell finished for her.

She nodded and smiled slightly.

"Where is he?"

He watched the walls she built so carefully slammed down in front of her eyes, ones he'd spent weeks and months learning to carefully negotiate earning her trust. But not anymore, she was that brick wall again, repelling all comers; she gave him a terse one-word answer, "out." He knew the conversation was over and left, passing Ted on the way out.

"Look out for you will ya? She's not as tough as everybody likes to think," he warned. Ted nodded mutely.

After the police car pulled away silence descended once more on the house; Crews' absence was felt by everyone in it.


	16. Chapter 16

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER SIXTEEN**

A nameless, faceless suit drove him home, dropped him at the entrance to the circular drive and sped off. When Crews whirled to check the plate – he wasn't surprised to find the car had a paper temporary dealer one. Good enough to pass cursory review by the highway patrol, so no one would look harder, but virtually untraceable. Still no clues to who "they" were and what this was all about, but right now he was too tired to care. He focused on getting into the house and up the stairs to what he hoped was a waiting Dani Reese.

He walked into his silent house, stood stock still for a moment just breathing and collecting himself; only then did he climb the stairs looking for Reese. He found her asleep in his bed and it was only then that the tightness in his chest eased. She was safe, she'd done as he'd commanded, although he wasn't sure his strong willed partner would obey him – she had. It was something new for them – him in control.

He was overwhelmed by the impulse to touch her, to feel her breath on his skin and smell the sweetness of her shampoo. He gingerly sat on the bed beside her and stroked her hair; she sighed in her sleep and shifted. He leaned close and once again repeated the words that were now his mantra – "I love you Dani Reese." He was rewarded by his mumbled name from her tired lips; he inhaled deeply, rose and left her to sleep. He needed a shower and a shave before he climbed in bed with her.

He walked into his bathroom and his own appearance shocked him. He looked like he did two years into his twelve-year stretch inside. The last week had aged him ten. He was badly in need of a haircut. He stripped off his clothes, which joined his partner's on the floor of his room. He kicked them aside and searched for scissors to trim his bearded face before even attempting shaving. Once he'd cut away enough to lather up, he began the task of shaving around his bruised and battered face. He ended up looking like he'd been on the losing end of a battle with a blender.

He showered and threw on a fresh set of boxer briefs and a t-shirt. In the morning, he'd burn their clothes now massed on the floor together – his bloody shirt mixed in with her bra and panties – lavender lace and bloody white cotton - a metaphor for the blending of their lives now. They were so very different and yet so much the same. They were mixed together far beyond work, far beyond play. Their lives, hearts and futures were entangled. Clinically, he knew to make her safe he needed to distance himself from her, but pulling away now would damage her in ways you could never see, but from which she would not soon recover.

_Which is worse death or a broken heart?_ Some days he wasn't sure, but one thing he knew - he could not decide for her. He didn't want her badly enough to risk her being harmed that was just selfish; the risk was to her so she had to decide. They'd talk, she'd know what he knew and she'd make the decision – he'd live with whatever she wanted. She knew he was not a white knight, he'd done things, been places, hurt people – but the one person he'd never hurt was her and he needed her to know that and to believe it.

He climbed very carefully into bed beside her and she sensed him, his warmth, his scent. She turned into him never fully waking as he gathered her against his chest and wrapped his tired body around hers. She mumbled his name again and he stroked her still damp hair and whispered into it, "it's okay honey, you're safe," moments before they both fell into a deep exhausted sleep.

* * *

><p>Dani was dreaming, she knew it, but she couldn't stop it. It was not a good dream. Crews was cuffed, faceless men in black suits were beating him. Charlie bled and bled. Blood soaked his clothes, streamed from cuts over his eyes and when they stopped - he blinked, stared at her and smiled. It was an eerie smile, like he didn't feel the pain or he enjoyed it. Crews spat blood and nodded for the men to continue. She couldn't wake up and the beatings continued as blows rained on her partner's fair skin and features. She thrashed in her sleep and then suddenly he was there holding her, soothing tones and a fair face with blue eyes. She hovered between in the twilight between waking and dreaming.<p>

"Charlie?" she croaked hoarsely.

"Were you expecting some one else?" his reply was so classically Crews it was sufficient to convince her she was no longer dreaming.

"You bastard," she roughly pushed him away.

"Yeah, but the bastard you love right?" he laughed, his bravado earned and only a small part for effect. She glared at him through a haze of sleep. He was daring her to deny it. He held her eyes strongly. There was mirth in his eyes. Anger and irritation colored hers – but underneath that something else – attraction, concern.

He kissed her hard and rolled them onto her back, pinning her under him. He held her still and deepened the kiss. She froze for a moment and then her response became feverish. They blazed with heat and fury.

"Tell me you love me, even if you have to lie," he said breathlessly when they broke and he latched onto her neck.

She arched into him, "I don't have to lie," she growled in response, but stubbornly refused to say the words.

He pulled back and cocked an eyebrow waiting for more.

She wouldn't give them to him.

"Close enough," he compromised and she smiled slyly before he descended on her lips again. "You think you've won, but I know you love me," he talked punctuating his speech with teasing kisses. "And you know how I know this?"

"If I say I love you, will you shut the hell up," she said in an exasperated sigh.

"Because you did as I asked you, and you've never done that before," he explained.

"Yeah," she punched him hard and was rewarded with a grunt of pain. "Because I left my partner with six thugs who just beat the stuffings out of him and just how is that an improvement?" She asked suddenly serious.

"I told you I'd come home to you," he countered.

"Did you think about what it would do to me if you weren't able to keep that promise?" She countered angrily.

"I will never not keep my promise to you," he vowed solemnly.

"You can't cheat death," her long held tear fell staining her cheek.

"Let go, over a cliff, die completely; then come back to life – after that you can not be deceived," he quoted Zen to her.

"God damn you Charlie. Don't quote me Zen," she whispered through tears.

"You're the life I came back to – it's how I know," he said gently. "And I do know, even if you never say it," he held her against him until she got control of her emotion.

It didn't take long before she collected herself and was all Reese and all business again. She peppered him with questions. "What did they want? How did you get home? Are you hurt? When did you have time to shave?" He smiled mutely until she ran out of queries and kissed her tenderly. She glared and demanded answers with her stare.

"Okay, okay," he settled against the headboard and pulled her against him stroking her hair. "They," he started, "brought me home in some car with dealer plates. Whoever they are, they want me to perform some unspecified demonstration of loyalty at some point in the future. I couldn't climb in bed with you looking like I did so I showered first – and shaved." He kissed her forehead thinking he was done.

"And?" she prompted.

"And what?" he wondered what he'd forgotten.

"Are you hurt?" her tone took on a decidedly embarrassed tenor. She was concerned about him – he had read her right. Not only did she want him back, but undamaged it would seem.

"Why don't I look okay?" he joked.

"You look like someone locked you in room with a pack of feral cats and added water," she remarked.

"Hey that's not very nice," he teased.

"No one every accused me of being nice, Crews," she replied.

He wound his hand in her hair and threaded the fingers of the other hands through hers, "I'm sorry that I had to make you leave. It's not that I don't trust you or want you by my side, it's just…"

"That I make you do stupid stuff," she finished for him.

"Well, not you… but the idea they would hurt you. Yeah," he said softly. "I'm afraid where you are concerned I can't see straight and that's dangerous for both of us."

"I know," she commented softly. "Crews?" she questioned.

He canted her head back and looked deeply into her eyes, "thought you were gonna call me Charlie?" he challenged. She actually blushed and it was adorable as the crimson shade crept up her throat. He touched her lips with his and then just breathed in the air around her.

"Charlie," she warned.

"Uh-huh" he murmured as he brushed her lips with his teasing her, tempting her.

"Are you gonna kiss me or what?" She sounded exasperated at him.

"Did you want me to?" he played with her want, fueled her desire and then as she opened her mouth to chide him he swallowed her comment with a deep, slow, wet kiss that left them both dizzy from lack of air.

Ted picked that moment to intrude and it caught them both very unaware. "Uh, guys…is everything okay?"

Charlie clasped his partner, almost lover to his chest and wrapped his arms around her protectively. "Uh, yeah, Ted…we're fine." Ted however did not take the hint and leave. He could be like that some times – obtuse.

"Are you in some kind of trouble?" Ted probed.

"When is he not in some kind of trouble?" Dani joked and climbed away from her partner wandering into the bathroom and out of the conversation. Both men's eyes followed her legs and when she disappeared Charlie gave Ted a decidedly dirty look for ogling his partner, almost girlfriend.

"I wasn't…" Ted stammered.

"Oh, yes you were," Charlie charged, but he was smiling when he said it.

"Okay, I was," Ted admitted. "She's hotter than the other girls Charlie, but are sure about this? She's Jack Reese's daughter, you know?"

Charlie rolled his eyes and his annoyance showed in his tone, "I know whose daughter she is. I also know Roman Nevikov told her that her father was dead."

"Do you believe that?"

"Doesn't matter," Charlie argued. "I love her," he stated emphatically.

"Oh, brother," Ted exclaimed slapping his hand to his forehead. "Why do you always do things like this Charlie?"

"I don't always do things like… things like what?" Crews sought clarification.

"Fall in love with impossible women," Ted stated the blatantly obvious fact that Charlie had a penchant for getting himself into impossible dilemmas with women her cared for - first Jen, then Connie and now the dark haired beauty in his bathroom.

"She's a seriously troubled girl, Charlie. Her father aside, she's a train wreck," Ted tried to draw his buddy's attention to the flaws in beneath the pretty girl. He knew he'd overstepped because Charlie looked truly angry at him for the first time since they'd known each other. "Look I'm just saying…look before you leap," he walked back his warning, but Charlie's eyes followed him and they were dark with anger.

"Get lost, Ted," Charlie succinctly tossed his friend out of his bedroom, but on the way out Charlie said something that let Ted know just how far gone his friend was. "Oh, and Ted? You got any more things to say about Dani – keep them to yourself. I don't want you to talk that way about her ever again."

"You and me have been friends a long time Charlie. I just don't wanna see you get hurt. I'm only trying to look out for you," Ted defended.

"You look after my money and let me worry about my heart," Charlie spoke the words coolly and without emotion.

"She's just…." Ted stubbornly refused to leave it alone.

"Leaving…" Dani entered the room having overheard the entire exchange while searching for something suitable to wear. "She's just - leaving," the annoyance in her voice at being talked about like she wasn't there was obvious.

"Dani," Charlie argued.

"I need to go home. I need something to wear that isn't sweats," she told him. "You can drive, put some pants on," she directed.

Charlie moved immediately disappearing into his vast closet.

Ted was right to be cautious when it came to Charlie, she knew she'd left a trail of lovers in her wake and it was widely known she was not reliable in her personal life. Part of her was irked at his insinuation and another part of her proud that he was so defensive of Crews – he was a good friend to her partner. He told the truth even when it was not going to be popular with Charlie- or her. He'd been tossed back into prison rather than roll over on Crews – his loyalty ran deep. He didn't deserve the drubbing Charlie was about to give him.

"You're right," she told Ted who stood his ground. "I don't deserve him, but I need him. And no, I'm not what's best for him, but I'm what he wants. He's pretty determined if you hadn't noticed," she said flatly.

Ted lost his voice and nodded mutely. "I don't mean anything against you… it's just…" he stammered considerably embarrassed knowing she'd overheard him.

"You're a good friend to him. Don't stop looking out for him," she remarked looking back to where Charlie was still buried in his closet getting dressed. "He's so busy looking out for the rest of us that he forgets to protect himself," she said in a much lower tone trying to keep that comment from her partner.

That impressed Ted. She wasn't angry, she accepted that she might not be what was best for Crews, but she had a point – Charlie was singularly focused and when he made up his mind it usually didn't change.

"I just want what's best for him," he said quietly.

"I do too," she confessed, "but we don't always get what we want. Some times we have to take what life gives us. I'm lucky – life gave me him."

Charlie emerged from the closet pulling a light sweater over his head, "how do I look?" he grinned at her mischievously.

"Like you went ten rounds with a weed eater," she teased, "and you need a haircut."

Ted stepped aside as they passed. Charlie stopped and she kept walking. Charlie looked at his friend sternly, then the look eased and began a patient examination that reached into their past association and the reason they continued to be friends.

"Crews," his partner shouted, "let's go," her demand echoed up the hollow stairwell.

"I love her Ted," Charlie said with a soft smile.

"Then you better not keep her waiting," Ted smiled nervously. Crews clapped his friend on the shoulder and nodded. Nothing else was said, nothing needed to be – Charlie had forgiven him in that moment and it would never come up again.


	17. Chapter 17

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER SEVENTEEN**

They drove in relative silence to her house, but as they pulled to the curb she stared through the windshield and told him her thoughts. "Don't be too hard on Ted. He's loyal enough to tell you unpleasant things and that's a pretty uncommon trait – one we could all use more of – honesty." Her delivery was cautious and he knew she'd heard what Ted said and it made her think hard about "them" together.

"Hey, we can do this," he promised, winking at her when she looked his way.

"Actually, you can get a haircut by yourself and I need some time alone," her wry smile and cheeky reply let him know she was okay and was nursing neither hostility nor depression at their situation. "I'm okay, go. You look scruffy and Crews? Scruffy is not a look that works on you," she said as she kissed his cheek.

He drove off when he watched her close the door and he knew she'd lock it behind her. Her service pistol was inside and any unwelcome visitor was going to get two bullets to the chest and one to the head. He smiled thinking about what a crack shot she was and how much she'd relish putting a couple bullets in those nameless faceless suits.

* * *

><p>His phone buzzed as he left the barbershop. He was preoccupied with why he always itched after a haircut no matter how much care the barbers took not to get hair down his collar. He absently flipped it opened and the text stared up at him. He wasn't sure text messages could look malevolent, but if they could this one did.<p>

It read _Call Group (310) 215-3799_ – the burner phone. A quick call to Tech Division before he returned the call confirmed it was an untraceable prepaid Pacific Bell phone. _Great another dead end_ he thought. He dialed the number and heard the line connect. There was a pregnant pause during which neither party spoke, then Crews delivered the opening volley, "You sent me a text."

"I trust you understand what a waste of time tracing our calls are?" The voice from the white tiled room spoke with a tinge of annoyance. "We require your assistance. The need is immediate and mission urgent," Charlie noted his tone was elevated and stress was present, but the man's statement did not require a response so Crews let the silence stretch. "We need you to kill Jack Reese," the man said succinctly.

"Can't," Crews said confidently, "Jack Reese is already dead."

"You are wrong Detective… about so many things, but about this you are gravely mistaken," the voice reclaimed it's control and haughtiness. "Jack Reese is very much alive. Ask your partner," the caller terminated the call and left Charlie speechless.

* * *

><p>She opened the door and if possible Crews looked paler than usual. His hair was neat, but his face a mixture of confusion and anger, beneath the cuts and bruises.<p>

"Your father is alive?" His question was tinged with disgust sprinkled with fear of treachery and pain showed clearly on his face. She knew in that instant that his fear of betrayal was roiling to the surface and her oversight was the reason for it. She'd been so preoccupied with him, his safe return and health - that she neglected Tidwell's news.

"Oh, shit…"she said her eyes wide and panic in her voice. "I nearly forgot…I did forget. He's in County. Tidwell came to the house while I was waiting for you. Said he'd turned himself in and wants to tell all - about the Bank of LA."

"Tidwell was at my house? In my house? Alone with you in my house? What else haven't you told me?" The horror in his tone was a by-product of the many betrayals he'd suffered.

Dani flashed anger at his insinuation. Then he recoiled as she reached to touch him.

Fear – fear in him - of her - laid her heart open. Their future balanced on the blade of a knife, then she demonstrated the strength he knew she possessed.

She reached for his hand making strong eye contact. His hand was cold; he did not grasp for her, but he did not pull away. He remained aloof, cool – hate and distrust locked under that layer of ice. He was far away in that moment, reliving his past and the hard lessons about trust he learned there.

"Charlie," she pled, "I'm not her. I wouldn't do what she did to you," she said gently.

He let himself be led into her small living room; a grey couch and chestnut colored coffee table the only furniture there. He did not sit and looked utterly uncomfortable. He looked as though he wanted to anywhere but there with her.

She dropped his hand and stepped away. She'd changed clothes while he was gone. She was wearing black jeans and white tank top. She wrapped her arms around herself as the chill of the situation permeated. They stood looking at each other for a long moment before he exhaled and told her, "They want me to kill him."

Dani was expressionless either by design or because she could not appreciate the profundity of their dilemma so he made it clearer for her.

"They want me to kill him to save you. If I don't…"

"I get it," she snapped and whirled away. Anger – her constant companion returned to sit on her shoulder. She breathed deeply, willing calm. He was hurt, she was hurt – this had disaster written all over it.

"Do you really believe I would betray you?"

"What?" his anger surfaced like a whale breaching the surface, mighty and powerful.

"Do you think I didn't tell you on purpose?" She turned to watch his face as she continued the questions. "Do you really think I'd just run back to him? That there was anything between us even close to what I feel for you?"

He took longer than she thought he should to answer, but finally gave her a plain and simple answer - "no." He pursed his lips to say something, and then checked himself. She goaded him.

"Go ahead, Crews. You got something to say? Say it," she spat.

He was being unfair in her opinion; she'd given him no reason to distrust her. If the fact her long missing father turned up while she was worried sick about him and she forgot it – it was his fault for worrying her so goddamned much.

He sucked in a deep breath of air and gave voice to his question. "I don't know what you feel for me," he tested the waters.

"Then you're a fucking idiot," she raged back.

"Why won't you say the words Dani?"

"Why is it so important?" she argued.

"Because you won't say it," he blew out his breath and gave up on her, on them.

She watched it happen – he disengaged and headed for the door. Her tears were hot on her face and then she did something she'd never done before, she stopped him with a word, his name – "Charlie?"

It wasn't even the word, his name or the setting that stopped him – it was the heartbreak in her voice when she said it. He froze. He couldn't face her. He just stood there – unable to leave, unwilling to turn back. Seconds stretched and he heard her gulp air trying hold back tears and gather the strength and will to say something that would keep him from walking out the already open door.

_Author's Note: Hats off to 'kanna' who got where this was headed first _


	18. Chapter 18

**Every Waking Moment **

**CHAPTER EIGHTEEN**

His skin burned, his heart pounded, his eyes and head hurt from holding in an emotion he swore he'd let go of. He wanted to run away and never look back. Jealousy and fear of commitment waged war in his brain. The desire to possess a woman – to claim her as his and for her to accept this claim- to honor it - consumed him. It never worked. He wanted to 'let go' as the Buddha counseled but he could not.

His mind flashed back to Roman Nevikov in a white suit in the elevator at the station, commenting from behind rose-colored shades. "_What if it was one of them who set you up?" _Roman's voice on the phone, telling him_ "You should ask your partner about the Bank of LA shootout. What happened to all that money?" _He remembered a young, angry Dani Reese engrossed in paperwork sitting less than four feet from him jabbing keys on her computer – Bobby Stark smiling from his navy blue patrol officer suit stuffing chewing gum in his mouth – and Charlie remembered thinking…it had to be Stark he meant. _What if it wasn't? _

His head swam and spun. He found himself wishing for the solitude of an eight by ten foot wall and no human contact in those moments, but his love for her grounded him. _Objects are not deceiving – they are deception. What we see, what we hear, all that our sense present to us are a fiction – no more real than a dream. We can only know that which we believe. That which we believe is all that we have._ Charlie knew he loved her and he believed she loved him. So he stayed rooted to that spot listening to her struggle for the three simple words that he could not seem to contain – 'I love you.' _She couldn't do it_ he realized – maybe because she didn't feel it and that concept twisted his heart like someone wringing a wet towel. He felt all the blood drain from him. If he didn't leave, he was sure he'd break.

"Dani," he said in voice so low it didn't sound like him, "I'm gonna go."

"Don't," she commanded sharply. "I just need a moment," the irony of her comment making it stick in her throat. This wasn't the first time she'd asked Crews for a moment in this very room.

"It shouldn't be this hard," he said in a gravelly tone. "What I feel for you I can barely contain, but I understand if you don't…." he couldn't bring himself to finish the sentence. "It's okay if you don't…" he lied.

"But I do," she whispered through tears. She looked at the ceiling biting back full on waterworks because she hated women who bawled. Then in a small quiet voice she continued as the glitter on the ceiling held her eyes and gave her something to focus on beside his back in the halo of the setting sun from her open door.

"Everyone I have ever loved has left…or died," she told him. "I promised myself I wouldn't do it anymore. I can't do it anymore. Losing people I love has nearly killed me – I can't do it again, Charlie. I just can't." She broke down as the last part came out as a sob and tears obscured her vision, but she didn't need to see because she felt him all around her.

His arms enveloped her, his soft lips were at her shoulder and the strong scent of his aftershave pervaded her senses. His warm fresh smooth face laid along her moist cheek as he told her "I know honey, I know. I'm sorry you've been hurt in the past. No one understands better than me trying to wall off your feelings. Half of what I use Zen for is to stiff-arm the rest of the world, but you? I can't help myself with you. You're like a fever in my blood - one I can't stop – one I don't want to stop. I feel more fully for you than I think I ever have for anyone and believe me I have tried not to," he explained their shared fears.

His chatter gave her time to return to herself. This man drove her absolutely berserk and he always would. Everything she felt for him was magnified ten fold and it always would be. _You can tell you heart not to feel, you can explain to it the risks and counsel caution but you just can't make it obey. _ It is a stubborn, spirited, wild horse that will not be broken. In those moments she realized that words wouldn't not stop him, when bullets and bullies couldn't. She also could not stop herself from loving him and words would not hold back her own wild heart.

It was juvenile to believe that the simple act of not saying the words would somehow forestall catastrophe. Chaos followed them, it was their constant companion and Charlie embraced it like some crazy jockey who climbed aboard a horse no one else dared ride. _God she loved him_, she realized and she always would.

She turned to face him and embraced her fate with the exhilaration of someone about to go over a waterfall, helpless against the raging tide, "I love you Charlie Crews." She said echoing his vow to her. They were the right words at the right time. "Are you happy now?"

"Yes," he said sharing a small, but true smile. "You make me very happy – when you aren't driving me mad," he explained their shared effect on one another. She laughed slightly and sniffled.

"I know the feeling," she admitted wryly. She loved him and the world hadn't ended – yet.

* * *

><p>They were sitting on her couch, closer than ever before – except perhaps in the car where the seats were intentionally close and it couldn't be helped, but it didn't feel weird. Dani considered the thought odd, but it occurred to her that she felt as though when she wasn't touching him she couldn't breath properly. She was hoping that part of being in love would pass. Her head lay against his shoulder and he stroked her hair absently. He, too, seemed unable or unwilling to stop touching her, although they had not progressed beyond simple handholding.<p>

Neither had spoken for the better part of the last hour. Occasionally he brushed his knuckles against her cheek, which although now dry still bore tearstains. Her fingers wound around his and his thumb brushed the back of her hand drawing little circles there. They were content to stay this way for a long time, but time was not on their side and they both knew it.

"Charlie?"

"Hmmm," he responded absently as though still in a waking dream.

"Are you going to…" she drifted off.

"Kill your father?" he finished her question.

She nodded against his chest, unable to say the words, but wanting to know his answer.

"If I have to - to keep you safe," his response was simple and plainspoken. "You know there's nothing I won't do to protect you." She knew it to be true, but also knew her partner; he was thinking of a way to have his cake and eat it too. He continued to talk, voicing his thoughts aloud as he often did, "I don't want to kill him. Actually that's not true, some times I've actually seen myself doing it. And after what you told me at the cabin, I'd like to do it slowly and make him suffer for what he did to you. But I don't want to 'have' to kill him and I don't want you to have to chose between me and your father."

"I'd choose you," she interjected.

"Now, but maybe someday you'd hate me for it," he predicted. "I know it's hard to envision a time when you won't be angry at him," he was speaking from experience on this subject, "but someday you might. I don't want that to come between us."

"What are you thinking?" she repeated a question she often asked him.

"I'm thinking about a way that it looks like I killed him, but one where he doesn't actually die," he posited. "I have the resources to relocate him and your mom both somewhere they can't be found, but they'd have to want to go," he offered. "How's your mom gonna be with this?"

She shrugged.

"You didn't tell her?" he was a bit shocked. Dani told her mom nearly everything.

"I forgot," she elbowed him. "I was kinda worried about someone," her sarcasm was caustic – it was no secret they both nearly destroyed each other less than an hour ago over her forgetting to tell him the same news.

"Yeah? Well don't ya think you should call her?"

"Like I haven't had enough drama today," she grumbled. "I'll call her tomorrow. He's been gone for almost a year, one more day won't matter," she justified.

"Will she take him back?"

"Yes," she answered testily sounding annoyed. "What choice does she have?"

"You mean because she loves him?" coyly asking a question he already knew the answer to.

She looked up at him annoyance, disgust and disdain showing plainly on her face to find him grinning. "Yes," she admitted in exasperation.

"Good to know," he joked, "loyalty's a good quality in a woman." He waited for her to take the bait, but she simply rolled her eyes. "Also a good quality in a golden retriever," causing her to punch him in the shoulder.

"You just watch and remember how she makes him pay," she threatened, "before you start thinking about what you can get away with, I want you to watch what she does to him," she warned but there was mirth in her voice. She was joking with him.

"So you're saying this terrorizing, menacing, ferocious thing you do? It comes from your mother?"

Her grin was predatory, "my mother makes my Dad look like a boy scout."

He swallowed hard, "I'll keep that in mind," then he grinned at her and continued to press his luck, "but I don't need to worry - I try never to make you mad at me."

"Oh, that's what this is," she teased, "you not trying to make me mad?"

"Uh – huh," he kissed her and held onto her lips until she relaxed again and let him continue his oral exploration. "I'd much rather make you feel other things," he murmured, lowering his hands to her thigh.

His warm palm rode up her jeans, past her thigh and hips staying at her waist. He kissed her as he tried to pull her into his lap, but she twisted and straddled him. She wound her hands into his hair and forced his head back. She look down at him with mischief in her dark eyes and smiled before she bent to kiss him. He didn't remember a lot after that.


	19. Chapter 19

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER NINETEEN**

She remembered the sensation of warmth and security; knowing it came from the strong solid form of her partner's long, lean body wrapped around hers. Their marathon week and the drama of the night before had worn them both out and although they began on the couch with amorous intent – they ended up in bed still fully clothed, for the most part, wrapped in the other's embrace as they slept soundly for several hours.

In the early morning hours, she grumbled for him to release her. He stubbornly refused, until she woke him to announce her intent was only to visit the bathroom. He wrung from her a promise to return quickly and when she did so, he snugged her against his body to hold her close for a few more precious minutes. Neither intended to sleep as late as they did, nor as soundly.

* * *

><p>Waking their collective lethargy was apparent as neither moved to rise and again her roaming fingers traced along his chest and his palms warmed her arms in a patient gentle exploration of the other. Tactile senses gave way to the wake of his advancing mouth planting soft open-mouthed kisses on her collarbone. Of course, it was Charlie so he had to talk.<p>

"I've never enjoyed just sleeping with someone the way I do with you," he admitted. "Not that I don't want more, but I love just holding you close and I sleep so well with you in my arms," he whispered against her throat.

"Seems like all we done this week is get beat up and sleep," Dani remarked.

"Getting beat up is hard work," her partner explained. He was about to take his oral exploration of her body to new levels when they heard the key in the front door, the door swing open and her mother's excited voice.

"Is that your…" he started.

"Mom," she hissed at him. "Get up," she tried to manhandle her bigger stronger partner to no avail.

"Uh, that's gonna be a problem for me right now," he nodded down.

"Shit," she swore softly, giggling.

Her mother picked that moment to appear in her bedroom doorway. Charlie could see the diminutive well-dressed Persian women arch an eyebrow in a familiar gesture he'd previously only associated with the young woman under him at the moment. "Dani?" her mother sounded angry – a tone he also recognized.

"Yes, mom – it's my house. I live here," Dani said in an irritated voice, throwing her head back and rolling her eyes at the intrusion.

"Would you like to introduce me to your friend?"

_It would seem sarcasm was in the Reese DNA_, Charlie thought as he tried not to laugh.

She whispered a warning at her partner's smile and the mirth in his blue eyes, "not a word, Crews. Not a fucking word."

"I'll wait in the living room, until you are dressed," her mother explained coolly.

Charlie pushed up and grabbed his shirt, "That's okay. I was just going for breakfast. I'll be back in a few minutes. Coffee, sweetheart?"

Dani scowled at him.

"I know what you like," he beat a hasty retreat under his partner's harsh glare. He passed Dani's mother at the door and repeated softly to her, "I know what she likes," smiling.

"I'm sure you do," again the acerbic side of Dani's mother showed her heavy contribution to his partner's gene pool.

"Hi, I'm Charlie," he grinned offering his hand. Dani's mother shook it only because to not do so would be unconscionably rude. "Did you want coffee too?" He was irrepressible in his buoyant mood.

Dani groaned and threw a pillow at him, "Just go," she commanded.

"She loves me," he explained with a conspiratorial wink on his way out.

When the door shut, silence descended on her small apartment and Dani looked up to find her mother looking at her with a mixture of curiosity and amusement. "He's not like anyone you've ever dated before," her mother remarked.

"He's not like anyone else on the planet," Dani remarked dryly.

"And yet you love him?" her mother prodded.

Dani sat up on her elbows and looked at her mother but did not answer.

"Do you need me to leave while you dress?"

"I am dressed," Dani said pulling the coverlet back and sitting up. "We…uh…fell asleep."

"So you are not sleeping with this man?" her mother asked confused.

"No. Well, yes…kind of," she became exasperated then scrubbed her face with both hands and groaned. "Sleeping, yes; sex, no – well, not yet anyway," she admitted.

"It would appear your young man is right," her mother ventured. "You do love him," she stated strongly, daring her daughter to deny it. "Your lifestyle is no secret to me and to have simply slept with a man is a sign of great trust and comfort. He must be quite special to you," her mother stated emphatically.

"He is," Dani admitted shyly gathering her hair in a ponytail and wrapping a rubber band around it, whilst ushering her mother out of her bedroom.

"And you let him call you 'sweetheart'? Dani, you do not even tolerate this from your own mother," her mother observed. "Well…" her mother demanded with a stare, "who is he?"

"Charlie Crews," Dani gave her partner's identity up. Her mother would find out soon enough, but the shock that crossed her mother's face was one Dani was not expecting.

"Your father hates that man," her mother stated the obvious.

"Yeah, well I don't," Dani's rebellious streak resurfaced.

"Clearly," her mother seemed annoyed more at who he was than at finding some random red head in her daughter's bed. "It is your father I have come here about," her mother continued. "He phoned me this morning…" Dani winced waiting for the words she knew were coming, "from jail."

"I know," Dani confessed. "I was gonna tell you, but things sorta got out of hand yesterday," she obliquely referenced things she couldn't hope to explain.

"You knew? And yet you did not see fit to tell me? His wife, your own mother?"

Dani knew her mother's temper; she'd inherited it. She was winding up for a full-fledged meltdown. Dani took her mother by the hand and led her to the couch. "Sit down, Mom," she demanded. "I can explain this, but I need Crews here too," she directed the terms of her explanation. "We're gonna figure this out – together."

Her mother wavered between fiery anger coupled with dirty looks and abject concern sprinkled with fear as she sniffled quietly for a few moments, while Dani tinkered in the kitchen and tried not to make coffee since Crews promised the good stuff. She was saved by the arrival of her partner about four minutes later. _Fastest coffee run he'd ever managed – he must have known she needed backup_ she thought.

He knocked on the door with his knee, since his hands were full. He juggled a cardboard coffee carrier with three tall coffees and plastic bag – full of fruit she had no doubt. He kissed her chastely on the cheek as he entered the apartment.

"Sure you got everything," she kidded with him.

He blew right past her sarcasm and began extolling the virtues of nectarines and seedless grapes. He set the cardboard carrier down and extracted her coffee first, holding it away from her until she "asked nicely." His grin drew a smile from her – right before she punched him in the stomach. "I think you love coffee more than me," he remarked rubbing his solar plexus.

He then turned to the second container and produced a chai latte for Dani's mother who watched them interact with obvious interest. "Mrs. Reese," he presented the drink with an exaggerated flourish, "tea for the lady."

"Cut the crap, Charlie," his partner scolded. "Dad called her," Dani explained.

Charlie's face fell, "oh," he remarked softly. "Well, he's alive," he highlighted the good side of things, "but he's in a good bit of trouble."

"My husband is always in some sort of trouble," Dani's mother remarked.

"Something we have in common," Charlie commented, resulting in a patented simultaneous eye roll from both women, Dani Reese was a carbon copy of her mother's mannerisms and temperament, which amused him to no end.

"Crews," Dani barked, "focus."

"Right," he settled down and pulled up a chair from her dining room table. He straddled it backwards and palmed a ripe nectarine examining it closely before biting into it. He chewed a few times and swallowed, "your husband is in jail because he surrendered himself for his part in the Bank of LA robbery and shootout."

If Dani's mother was surprised by this disclosure you would never have known it from looking at her. She was a blank slate, showing him nothing, so he continued.

"The people he was in business with - now want him dead," he continued speaking plainly, "and they want me to kill him." That got a reaction, as Dani's mother's eyes dilated in fear and her nostrils flared. Charlie waited for her to say something. Dani drew a breath to speak, but he silenced her with a stern look.

"Because of what he did to you," Dani's mother divulged she knew her husband's part in Crews' wrongful imprisonment. "They will use you because of what he did to you. It haunted him," she explained, "but these people they are powerful." Her eyes held contrition and regret.

"Yes, well," Charlie continued, "luckily so am I." He smiled softly. "I want you to be happy, but you can't do that here. I can move you somewhere far beyond their reach and then you can put this behind you," he coached.

"Why would you do that for us?"

"I think you know why," he explained but said it anyway, "Because I love your daughter." Dani's hand came to rest on his shoulder and he reached up to cover it with his, but his eyes never left her mother's, "and because I owe these men some of their own medicine." There was a dangerous, dark look in the fair man as he said those words.

Dani's mother found herself examining the same qualities in Charlie Crews that first attracted her to Dani's father. He was a strong man. He did not know fear except when it came to those he loved and he could be cruel but not to those dear to him. She found herself respecting her daughter's choice in mates despite her husband's distaste for the man.

"What do you need me to do?" Dani's mother asked.


	20. Chapter 20

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER TWENTY**

"Okay, Einstein," Dani started in on him as soon as he sent her mother to pack a few things, "what are you thinking?"

"I got this, honey," he kissed her on the forehead and ignored her question.

"Hey," she barked, "did you…you did - you just blew me off there didn't you?"

"Yep," he walked to within inches of her, taking her chin between his thumb and forefinger and tipping it up to meet his eyes. Such fire there, such passion, he nearly became lost in them, but he stayed focused on the task at hand.

"This is a dance; only one person leads. At work you've been used to leading and I've been content to let you. But this is home and here I lead, Dani," he looked deep in her eyes waited for her to surrender.

"Because?" she challenged.

"At work you are more experienced and I respect that," he tread lightly, "but in life I think I have a little more time in this game, I know jails and prisons and I have a lot more bad experiences there than you do." He waited for her to consider his premise before continuing, "plus I'm a man and we have fragile egos, so you could let me feel like I'm in charge of something small, like say…protecting my girl? Could ya?" he joked.

She grinned darkly at his colorful comment, but negotiated, "We're still partners, which means if you're gonna do something stupid or dangerous you tell me first," she glowered.

"Don't I always?" he replied with more cheer than their situation called for.

"Fine," she acquiesced. "Tell me your plan, but I reserve the right to veto anything that might get you killed."

"That's my girl," he tugged her against his chest and pressed his lips to her hairline. "Stubborn to the end," he murmured into her hair, when she pulled back and eyed him skeptically, he added "but I love stubborn, it's one of your most endearing qualities."

"I am not stubborn," she pouted.

He laughed loudly. It was a noise that surprised her. She'd never heard Charlie laugh before. He had a wonderful laugh, a rich baritone and his face lit up. She frowned even harder.

"When you get that look on your face," he shared, "I can see you at six years old refusing to touch your green beans. I bet you were a cute kid, honey."

She continued glaring and add the eyebrow for effect and he gave up, "Okay, business it is. My plan is really pretty simple. Sit down, I'll tell you." They were partners in everything - crime, crime fighting and some day when they caught a break – in life and love. She would follow him to the very gates of hell itself, side by side, to the end of their time on the planet.

* * *

><p>She listened somewhat patiently, nodding from time to time and chewing her bottom lip at others. He laid out his ideas and explained what would happen to get her father out of County and into a private jet with her mother bound for somewhere the Group could never find them. He spun down and looked at her expectantly.<p>

She climbed to her feet and paced a few feet before whirling to meet his gaze. "No," she said tersely, "it's too dangerous."

"They won't actually hurt him," he defended. "He'll just look hurt so they'll take him to the hosp…"

She covered his moving mouth with her small hand, "not for him. It's too dangerous for you," she qualified.

"Honey," he lowered his tone, "they haven't invented something too dangerous for me." It was part bravado, but largely true. He'd lost most of his fear in Crescent City. Luckily he'd held onto his humanity; although for a while, when he first got out, he thought he'd lost that too. She was the one who taught him he hadn't. She was the one who nursed him back to the world and the people in it and she didn't even know it. He took her hand and looked deeply at her.

"Trust me," he implored, "Dani, trust me."

She stepped into his personal space and whispered quietly, "I do. It's everyone else I don't trust, including my father. What if this is just some elaborate ploy to get you involved in something? What if my father is still working for them? All this hinges on him cooperating and I don't know that he will," she argued her concern for him.

"Then let's find out," he offered.

"How?"

"They'll let you visit," he suggested, "You're family."

"Charlie," she resisted, "I don't even know him."

"Then don't think of him as your father," he guided, "think of him as another perp. You have good instincts, maybe the best I've seen. I trust you. Go see him. Then tell me what you think and I'll do whatever you say," he vowed.

"If you do that'll be a first," she groused.

"Just try," he urged. She shrugged.

She'd do it; he knew she would. He knew her sometimes better than he knew himself. Deep down, she wanted her father to be the man she remembered, not the man she knew. He prayed for the first time in a long time that Jack Reese could be what his daughter needed him to be – just this once.


	21. Chapter 21

**Every Waking Moment **

**CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE**

"Yes, you can see him," Tidwell consented, but doubt showed clearly on his face. Dani's temper and her father's in the same small room could spell trouble. Both Detectives smiled appreciatively at the news.

"You," he pointed at Dani, "not you," he pointed at Crews and his look was much more grim. "I still think this is a bad idea," he said sounding like he was being forced into something he thought was a bad idea. To be truthful, he sounded like that a lot when it came to the two of them.

"You, Dan…Detective Reese and your mother," Tidwell said acquiescing as though the act was causing him physical pain. "Because you are family and only because you are family," he continued saying as they walked out on him. "And I still think this is a bad idea," he shouted after them.

"I won't go in, but I'm coming and I'll be watching out for you," Crews told her under his breath as he put his gun and badge on his belt, readying himself to go. "I'll be just outside if you need me."

She shook her head at him and held his eyes, "No, you want me to trust you? Then you trust me. I'm going - alone. Well, with my mother…but mostly alone."

He had to admit she was tough, his partner, and she was right. He nodded and she left him alone in the squad bay. He sat at his desk and watched her walk out. She was going to county and he'd have to wait for her to return. Part of him was relieved because the act of returning to a prison always caused his heart to beat faster and palms to sweat. His stress level still rose for this time it was his turn to worry about her.

* * *

><p>The guards led him in an orange jumpsuit and cuffs. Dani's mother gasped at his appearance. Despite the rule against touching, which they'd both been briefed on, she recovered quickly and hugged her husband. No one said a thing; Jack Reese was still a cop, still segregated from the rest of the prisoners and still afforded a degree of respect.<p>

Dani stood with her arms crossed and displeasure plain on her face.

"Dani," he greeted her coolly, she nodded at him.

Her lips were pursed and he knew she knew what this was about, "Dad."

She greeted him levelly, but the fear and deference his daughter had always shown him was gone. She'd changed, she was stronger and yet, calmer than he'd ever known her to be. It was like she'd matured five years in the one he'd been gone. The fierce little girl had grown up; she was a rock now – like her mother. Stone fired and forged in hell but rock solid and unbreakable. She was ready for what he needed to tell her.

"I need to tell you both something, before you hear it from someone else," he admitted. "I'm not proud of myself and some of the decisions I've made, but I need for you both to know that I did what I did - because I thought I was doing something good for us – our family."

"Dad," Dani interrupted sounding exasperated at him like her mother. "Can it," she demanded, "we got time for your mea culpas later." She was in control of the situation and herself. The anger that ruled her affect was sublimated and she was confident like he'd never seen her.

"What happened to you Dani? You're different," he observed with a hint of pride in his voice. "It's like you've…" he paused unwilling to say the words.

"Grown up?" she finished for him. He nodded.

"I have," she pronounced. "What I need to know, what you need to tell me is why you're here, why now? Why come back? You'd left and we were doing okay, so what's this about Dad? Is it about Crews?"

Jack's face turned to ash. He looked like he'd swallowed turpentine before he spat an angry answer at her, "What? No! This is about us – our family - not some complete stranger. I don't give a damn about Charlie Crews." His voice bordered on shouting as his tone became elevated.

"You had better give a damn about Charlie Crews," Dani's mother hissed at her husband. Now that the initial joy at her husband's safety had worn off – anger flooded her. "Your daughter does," her fury at the situation reached the boiling point as she shouted at her husband.

She tried to stop her mother, but she knew that to be impossible. She shook her head just before her mother said the words, but it was too late. Their secret was out. Her father looked at her disgust filled his features.

Ordinarily, she would have reached for anger, but she found her center. Dani went the other direction; she got quieter. As the chaos of her parents' anger spun around her; she heard Charlie's voice in her head and it grounded her.

"Shhh," she said calmly. Her soft tone drew both her parent's attention, because it was entirely uncharacteristic for their mercurial daughter. "Do you want to live? Do you want to live together? Are you willing to go anywhere to make that happen?"

"What the hell kind of question is that?" her father barked.

"A really important one, maybe the only important one left for you," she held his eyes and responded.

His heavy sigh filled the room.

No one said anything until Dani's mother responded with a simple one-word response, "yes." This drew Jack's attention. He nodded.

_At least they agreed on something_, Dani thought wryly.

"Then when the time comes," she whispered as she walked closed and hugged her father, "be ready."

"Could you be more cryptic?" he tersely replied.

"You'll know because they'll tell you Charlie Crews says not to worry," she smiled, enjoying the fact he was going to owe his life and freedom to the man he'd wronged so horribly. She released him and enjoyed the horror in his eyes. _Yes, this might actually be enjoyable to watch,_ she thought.

"Well, that's just fuckin' great," he shot the dirty comment under his breath.

"He could just as easily have you killed," she replied. "But he's not like you, he's nothing like you," she swore softly at her father.

"He's a killer and don't you think any different. He may not have been one when he came in here, but he became one Dani. Make no mistake – that man is not innocent," her father shouted.

"I know what he is, I know who he is, which is more than I can say about you," she gritted through clenched teeth fighting to control her anger. "He's my partner," she vowed, "and he always will be."

"I don't know about that," he father tried to laugh off her loyalty.

"You could fill a volume of encyclopedias with the things you don't know," she shot back caustically.

"Enough," Dani's mother shouted and they both shut up and glowered at each other.

"Will you come with me? Leave this behind and make a new life?" she asked her husband. He nodded mutely. "Then you will do as she says and you will trust her partner because she does," she pronounced regally.

Jack Reese opened his mouth to respond and his wife shut him down with a stern look. "What other choice do you have really? You can stay and die in prison – if they let you live – or hope that someday they," she gestured at Dani, "will bring your grandchildren to visit."

"What?" Jack snapped. "What grandchildren? She's not even dating anyone," the elder Reese argued.

Dani simply groaned, "Mom," like she was sixteen again.

"Oh, but she is. She's already in love with him and this man will be in her life for a long time, perhaps forever and you already know him," she hinted haughtily. "The time for secrets in this family is past. I will not stand for it any longer. Tell him Dani or I will," her mother threatened.

"Who?" her father narrowed his eyes and skeptically examined her.

She returned his glare, breathed deeply and then willed herself to relax. She unkinked and uncoiled her tense muscles, her sense of calm returned and with it her smile. Charlie's gift to her was patience, calm and inner strength; his belief in her restored her faith in herself. She smiled, looked her father right in the eye and told him her future in a single word, "Crews."

He shook his finger at her and said one word, "no."

"We're leaving now, Dad." Dani smiled at her father from a position of strength and confidence. Nothing would change, she'd disappointed her father yet again, but she knew in her heart that her choice was sound. She was in love with Charlie Crews – her mother knew and approved of her choice - her father knew and didn't, but the world still hadn't ended – not yet.


	22. Chapter 22

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO**

It was quite late by the time she finished with her mother and headed home, but as she steered her car home in the dark with headlights and random bit of night neon filling her windshield, she found her small, silent apartment was not where she wanted to be. She wanted to be with him, with Charlie and so she drove there.

His door was, of course, unlocked. Ted raised a longneck beer bottle in mock toast from the kitchen where he was drinking alone. He silently pointed to the stairs. She tipped her fingers at him returning his jaunty salute as she quietly climbed the stairs to her partner's bedroom.

He woke the moment the soft nick of the door opening came to him through the dark. Then a sliver of light from the hallway backlit his partner in silhouette. She cleared her throat to alert him of her presence making him smile. She could be so sweet sometimes, almost shy. He'd tried to wait up for her, not even sure if she'd come home to him, but the last week took a toll on his body and it demanded rest, so he retired to the comfort of his thick comfy bed and had drifted off.

"Hey," he said quietly in a gravelly tone.

He could imagine her tight smile even though he couldn't see it. She wanted to be here, but now she was unsure of herself. She went predictably to where he knew she would – to where she was comfortable – to work, to the task at hand. All business, it was where she buried her fears. "Uh, he said…" she began.

"Dani?" he interrupted.

"Uh-huh…" she sounded so unsure.

"Come to bed, honey," he said patiently. "All that can wait til morning," he urged gently.

"Yeah," she surrendered and released the breath she'd been holding, "it can wait."

He listened as she undressed in his closet, washed her face and brushed her teeth with a new toothbrush he'd thoughtfully laid out for her. She emerged from the bathroom once again swallowed in his pale blue shirt.

"I don't think I'll ever wear that shirt again," he smiled at her. "It looks too good on you," he continued as she slid under the covers to join him.

"You bought me a pink toothbrush?" she questioned with laughter in her tone.

"No," he laughed. "Ted does the shopping. He bought you a pink toothbrush. I would never buy you pink. Do they make black leather toothbrushes?" he kidded. She sighed contentedly as he gathered her to his chest and continued talking to relax her.

"I didn't even know there were toothbrush color options – all the ones in Pelican Bay were green. Before then I never really noticed my toothbrush much. It was just one of many things I took for granted." He felt her unwind as he talked. She'd become accustomed to his nonsensical tangents of on the virtues of fruits and the teachings of Buddha, so toothbrush colors was a pretty normal thing for Charlie to pontificate about.

"Charlie?" she yawned. He stopped talking and looked down into her big dark eyes.

"Pink's fine," she told him.

She smiled up at him and felt the stress of the day melt away. He was like those rocks in the sauna that emit heat like little furnaces, so he kept the room quite cool. It was a pleasant sensation to be nestled between the coolness of the high thread count sheets and his warm sinewy body.

"You know some day I'm gonna get to second base with you," he yawned.

"If you're lucky," she teased back and kissed his shoulder, before nestling her head into the hollow there. He kissed her forehead, smiled and snuggled her close against his side. Within minutes their breathing patterns matched and they fell into a deep untroubled sleep.

* * *

><p>His plan called for Jack Reese to be put in the infirmary by some of his prison contacts who would never see freedom again. This was the only fun they could have. Those men actually considered the prospect of beating down a cop like Jack Reese enjoyable. They said Crews was doing them a favor, but promised resolutely not to kill him, "just hurt him – a little." Charlie knew that meant it wouldn't be much of a stretch for the elder Reese to feign internal injuries requiring a transfer to a less secure hospital – somewhere outside the prison.<p>

While he was in segregation, which provided the illusion of safety - they could still get to you if they wanted to - no one knew this better than Charlie Crews. Part of him relished the fact Reese would be beaten into submission and experience for a few moments the fear he lived in for years - inside. It was a part of his character that Charlie worked hard to sublimate, but it was still there - his monster, vengeance and the thirst for payback. Some days it was stronger than he was; some days he indulged because it was useful, but he tried not to delight in it.

Charlie arranged it with Bobby Stark to be Jack's escort back to prison when he was cleared to be transferred back to County with nothing more serious than bruised ego. Stark stopped enroute and picked Crews up. Charlie was carrying a set of pliers.

"What the hell is that for?" Jack asked.

This?" he held the small shiny pair of pliers up and smiled, "is for proof that you're dead." Crews was indulging his darkness. "Open your mouth Jack," Crews commanded.

"Fuck you Crews," Jack spat.

Charlie sighed heavily, "I'm trying to help you Jack." He grinned. "You're about to die in a fiery car crash and something needs to survive the fire to identify you. Something that matches your DNA," he explained. Then Charlie whipped out his knife, "Or would you rather I take a finger?"

"Shit," Reese swore and opened his mouth.

Charlie pulled a molar with no Novocain and Reese just gutted it out. He groaned a couple times, but never cried out. He was actually tougher than Charlie given him credit for. "Spit in this," Crews commanded as he handed him a plastic baggie. "We need the blood and saliva for the crash. Splash it around the car, who knows? Some might survive the fire. That and the tooth, plus you vanishing into thin air should be enough to convince them you are dead."

"But I won't be dead," Reese mumbled with a bit of uncertainty under his normally steady, sure tone.

"No," Charlie said solemnly, "you won't be dead, Jack."

"Why Crews? Why would you help me?"

"You know why," Crews responded patiently holding the older man's eyes.

"Dani?" Reese's acerbic tone bit hard in the small car, "so tell me this isn't some payback thing where you fuck my daughter over to get back at me?"

There were times when Crews wrestled his better angels and that ferocious need for vengeance surfaced without warning getting the better of him – this was one of those times. He accepted that his darkness like his light were a part of him, just not a part he indulged often, but this time Charlie took the gratuitous easy cheap shot and popped Reese soundly in the jaw. He felt his fist connect and saw the older man's head snap back. No one sullied Dani, especially not her father.

"I would never do that to her," Crews said as his look turned decidedly dark.

"Cause you love her right?" Reese's comments dripped sarcasm and his lips dripped blood.

"DNA," Crews demanded raising the baggie in Reese's hands to his face. Crews was all business again; his momentary outburst over. This was the cost of his future with Dani Reese and her father wasn't going to provoke him into losing it.

"Charlie?" Stark questioned. "You ready?"

The prearranged corner was coming up. It was specially selected in an area that no traffic cameras covered it. It was not in the line of sight of any public places or obvious witnesses. No pesky ATMs were present for blocks to snap random shots with them in the background revealing the ruse. The "accident" would involve a car stolen this morning, wrecked, wiped clean and burned along with the cruiser they were travelling in. A very fast exchange would take place and the next time anyone saw Jack Reese would be at his funeral; the one where they buried a canister of ash.

The DNA in the car and the tooth recovered, plus the testimony of two decorated cops; himself and Stark would convince folks that Jack Reese died in the burned up car. "Strapped in the back in cuffs, they just couldn't get him out – the fire was just too hot," that was the story they'd rehearsed. Stark would tell it as well as the Bank of LA story by the time they got around to interviewing him. The fact that Bobby didn't back him up the first time made his former partner was rock solid and unimpeachable. Stark would never again be intimidated by IAD.

All that was left was to sell the story at the Department, which was Dani's job.

A saddened Detective Reese in dress blues would tell co-workers that her mother departed on a commercial flight for her home country the week prior and plane tickets would exist to confirm that fact. Her mother returned to her ancestral home in Isfahan because she was unable to deal with the embarrassment of her husband's arrest; a convenient excuse for her absence at the funeral.

The private jet carrying Jack would pick Mrs. Reese up in Dubai, where Dani's mother would never make her connecting flight bound for Tehran. Middle Eastern countries with which the US did not have formalized relations had spotty history of reliably reporting the comings and goings of US citizens, so Tehran was the perfect final destination she'd never make it to. From Dubai they would departed for East Asia to a location Dani did not know and therefore could not tell if pressed.

Charlie promised they'd visit them someday in a few years, but vowed they were safely hidden in a place no one would find them. Dani did not argue with him – her trust apparent in his skill and finesse.

All that remained was their serious and public fight over her father's death and the forced sabbatical it took to sell it. He was about to find out just how good Dani Reese was at pretending to be mad at him and he wasn't looking forward to it.


	23. Chapter 23

**Every Waking Moment**

**CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE**

He stood before her bruised and battered, yet again. This time you could add burnt to his repertoire as she noticed the singed coat, hanging over his arm and smoky smell coming from him. Then her focus narrowed and she noticed the gauze wrapped around his left arm from his wrist to elbow. _Damn him_, she thought, _he did get hurt_.

Her eyes narrowed, locked on his and an entire conversation occurred without words – one in which he knew she was concerned but couldn't show it and one in which he assured her without words that he was fine. It was over in a moment, but it was one that would continue the rest of their lives in one way or another.

He subtly nodded indicating their scripted fight should start. She steeled herself and summoned the anger that was easy for her. She didn't have to reach too far because she really was pissed at him for getting himself hurt.

"What the hell happened?" she blurted out the opening salvo.

"There was an accident, Dani." He looked down guiltily, "Your father was pinned in the car. I couldn't save him. I tried. I'm sorry, I'm so very sorry." He reached to touch her and she knocked his hand away.

She stood stock still for a moment counting to ten to create the illusion of shock. She opened and closed her mouth a few times, but no noise came out. Then suddenly and with no warning, she slapped him, as hard as she could.

"You bastard," she spat slapping him again with as much force as she could summon. His head snapped to the left from the blow, blood dribbled from the corner of his lip and he tried his best to look contrite. His eyes betrayed him, but only to her.

"That was my father," she raged, "I trusted you." She stormed out.

The bay was as silent as a tomb as he gathered his coat and after a respectful interval followed. He arrived at his home and her car sat in his drive – she was home – at their home – the one they would make together. He stiffly rose from the car and before he reached the front door it swung open and her small dark form came flying at him.

"I'm sorry," she hugged him to her so tightly it hurt, but he said nothing, "I'm so…"

He shushed her and held her close with the one arm that seemed to be working. They stayed that way for several moments, before she tugged him toward the house by his lapels. She never asked him how it went or if it went, she trusted him implicitly. He would tell her if there was a problem. She would never ask him about it – he knew this with a certainty that he thought lost. Her faith in him was the missing link in his connection to a world he'd forgotten. She completed him and made him whole again by her absolute silence in that moment. Trust was something they'd both lost once but found again in each other.

"Come in," she shepherded, "I wanna take a look at that burn." He liked Dani fussing over him. He played along as she pealed off his coat, unbuttoned his shirt and pulled it off his scorched body. They were standing in the foyer and she'd just stripped him down to his t-shirt, her focus was still solely on his arm.

His focus was on her; the way she looked, the way she smelled, the way she felt.

He toed his loafers off and swept her hair back with his good arm and leaned close to kiss her neck. Dani felt the shift in things and froze. His injured arm wrapped around her gingerly and he pulled her against him carefully, as though she might break.

"I think I'd like to go upstairs, now," he told her in a low tone.

"Are you feeling lightheaded?" she asked coyly.

"Yeah," he sighed, "that's it," he sank to kiss her mouth and they fused together. Somehow they made it halfway up the stairs before her shirt came off. He pinned her the wall and kissed her hard and deep. When he drew back his good hand trailed down her chest to the hollow between her breasts and beyond.

"I think these stairs might be more than we can handle," he said sinking to her chest, cupping the satin covering her breast as he pressed the long line of his body into the softness of her body. His mouth and tongue were loosed and busy; he was blessedly silent for once as he put her in exquisite agony. She arched against him and his moan was singularly gratifying. When he drew back, her hands were in his hair and she held him still smirking.

"What?" he was breathless with wonder in his voice.

"You have my hand print on your face," she grinned.

"You hit like a girl," he grinned back, teasing and kissing her hard and taking the temperature up a notch. They were on fire. He thought the marble walls might burn from their heat. He took both of her hands and pinned them over her head as he put his mouth on her in placing that made her writhe in response. She giggled and he continued to tease her, "Let's see if I can end up with your hands in other places." He picked her up and began carrying her up the stairs.

"Charlie," she sounded shocked, "your arm."

"Can't feel it," he told her, "I can't feel anything but you, honey."


	24. Epilogue

**Every Waking Moment**

**Epilogue**

After that night, they strictly enforced a separation for appearances. The premise was she'd gone there to his house, confronted him, they'd fought and she'd left - not anything like the type of heated exchanged that actually occurred.

Officially, he was suspended (again) and she was on leave grieving her father's death. There were to be no visits, no phone calls, no contact at all. The separation proved excruciating for them both. They both knew there would be this period of time; they'd have to spend apart, while she pretended to be pissed at him. This would cement things with the Department and the Group, but neither of them realized how much they'd miss one another.

He meditated to pass the time, but that proved difficult to maintain. Every time he closed his eyes he could feel her skin, her moving under him, smell her shampoo, hear her voice in the dark. So he planned a Zen garden in the backyard to distract himself. He sketched out the diagram, went to the home improvement store and bought the stones, sand and plants to build it. He was sweating under the hot LA sun about a week into his "suspension without pay" when the text came.

He dialed the burner phone without bothering to check anything.

"What?" he questioned as soon as he heard the call connect.

"No body Detective?" the voice questioned, "clever," the man sounded impressed.

"I did what you asked. You weren't specific about how and you didn't say anything about needing a body," he spat the words angrily. "It probably cost me my partner; the only person that I truly trust. And it still might cost me my job. Don't know if you've heard but I'm on IAD's top ten list," his voice was dry and unhappy. If he sounded genuinely perturbed, it was largely a by-product of not having seen Dani Reese in over a week.

"I guess we'll have to presume you did as directed…until circumstances prove otherwise," the man rolled the prospect around on his tongue unconvinced Crews had done as they commanded.

"They never will," Crews said flatly, "he's gone."

"We'll see," the voice laughed. "Oh, and Detective? I think she'll take you back. If she loves you anywhere near as much as you do her," the man's hoarse, hollow laugh was cut short as he terminated the call.

Soon Charlie told himself, they'd be back together soon. He returned to his task, using the hoe to break up the rocky soil. He removed the stones and leveled the ground. The sun was high in the sky and he was sweaty and exhausted. But at least she was out of his head for a few hours. He filled the area with white sand and a few small black stones and then planted short dense boxwood plants with dark green leaves around the boundary of his small garden. He was watering the freshly planted shrubs when the patio door opened. He assumed it was Ted and didn't even turn to acknowledge it.

"Crews," his partner called from the cool, dark, kitchen, "when you're done screwing around out there," she teased, "come inside I've got something I think you're gonna wanna see."

His project was abandoned immediately. The sound of her voice was like water to a man wandering in the desert. He yearned to see her. His eyes took few second to adjust to the darkness of the house, but he soon found himself staring at the rich olive skin of his partner wearing nothing but a pair of lavender panties and a lacy bra of the same color. His mouth was dry from exertion, but it felt like cotton for a whole other reason.

"Say something," she demanded with her hands on her hips.

"Like what?"

"I haven't seen you for over a week and you've got nothing to say to me, Crews," she arched an eyebrow and dropped a bra strap off her shoulder.

"Words fail me," he said quietly as he approached her and shed his work gloves.

"That'd be a first," she joked.

He trailed his hands from her shoulders to her wrists, just mesmerized by his hands touching her skin, which was so very exposed. He leaned to kiss her and she stopped him with a hand in the middle of his sweaty grey t-shirt.

"Aren't you going to shower first?"

"Why?" he wondered. "We're just gonna get sweaty again," he argued.

She considered his premise. It was Charlie logic and therefore made sense only to him - and apparently now to her. She considered she was struck with the same affliction that her partner suffered from, but she thought it was a delightful disease. She removed her hand from his chest and wrapping it around the back of his neck.

"You really should wear sunscreen Charlie," she remarked absently as he bent to trail his kisses along her jaw line.

"I wore a shirt," he offered a weak defense.

"Which you no longer need now that you're indoors," she concluded pealing it off over his head. He grinned back at her, as the latticework of scars there told a history of flesh and metal; pain and healing. She traced her hands along his rib cage.

"Ribs better?" she questioned. He nodded mutely not wanting her hands to stop.

"Thought we were going to stay apart two weeks?" he couldn't help commenting on their agreed sabbatical period. She seemed to have missed him nearly as much as he did her – which was every waking moment, but she'd succumbed first, which made his head spin with possibilities.

"Do you want me to leave?" she asked coyly.

"I want you…" he trailed off as he feathered his fingers against her smooth skin.

"You want me to what?" she teased.

"I want you to stay," he leaned close and kissed her tenderly.

"For the night?"

"Forever," he murmured against her cheek.

"I don't think I packed for forever," she joked as she unbuttoned his jeans.

"That's okay, we don't need clothes, or things. They are just stuff, we can buy more stuff," he said his Zen sounding hollow even to him.

"Oh, but we need a Zen garden?" She laughed.

"No, but had to find something to do," he continued talking as she continued with the buttons on his fly. He watched her hands work as he talked. "I couldn't sleep without you. I couldn't stop thinking about you," he confessed.

"That's sweet, Charlie," she said.

"No, it's not," he moaned as he pressed her against the wall and kissed her hard. His hands were in her hair. "It possessive, it's desirous, it's totally un-Zen," he complained when he came up for air.

"Fuck Zen," she smiled. "I like possessive."

"Then you're gonna love me," he grabbed her by the hand and began dragging her toward the stairs. "I might not let you out of bed for a week," he vowed intently, "but I promise you won't be bored," he grinned devilishly at her. He was going to drive her crazy but in the best possible ways.

* * *

><p>"Do you think he really did it?" the man asked. "Killed Jack Reese?"<p>

"No. Too shades of Mickey Rayborn," the response came. "Reese is still alive, but as long as he's not talking to the LAPD or the FBI we needn't waste time looking for him."

"Does it bother you that Crews continues to be uncontrollable?"

"No," the man said tersely, "we still have something he cares about deeply, something we can hurt to keep him in line – Jack Reese's daughter. Charlie Crews may never be controllable, but he may be made manageable by his own desires," the prescient comment spoke of a future they could not envision yet, but one that would come.

Nothing can hold back the passage of time – the only constant in the world is change. They were happy now, but only time would tell if they'd stay that way. Control is an illusion, but an illusion they were willing to believe in.

=====TO BE CONTINUED====

_Author's Note: Here ends the tale. This tale, this time - not an end, but a beginning._

_I'm going to dive into a bit of shameless self-promoting here. If you liked this story and would like to see the adventure continue, please hit the review button and LMK. _

_If you really liked it and think your friends would too – please use the FB and Twitter links to get the word out. I think these characters are too rich and textured to die and I'd love to see more writers creating a future for them in fandom. __Thanks for staying with me on this ride and I hope you found it a good investment of your valuable time. _


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